


Origin Stories

by hollycomb



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: First Meetings, First Time, M/M, Snoke is Miss Havisham
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-07-22 20:05:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 31,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7452271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollycomb/pseuds/hollycomb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nineteen-year-old Hux goes on a tour of his father's stormtrooper training facility and meets a strange, hooded financier and his equally strange but far more intriguing apprentice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Hux is expecting the usual stuffy lunch in the instructors’ lounge when he visits his father, then perhaps a walk around the grounds of the Academy. Later there will be a droid-prepared dinner at home on the estate, followed by the comfort of retiring to his childhood bedroom for a few days of recreational reading. The others in his division will make fun of him when they find out he used his first shore leave to spend time with his father instead of embarking on a drunken jaunt to the nearest pleasure planet, a caper the rest of them have been boasting about for weeks, but Hux is not a short-sighted person. Though he’s only nineteen years old, he has a detailed plan for the rest of his life, and it doesn’t include having blackmail-ripe holo images of him taken while he’s drunk and fucking around on some disease-ridden brothel of a planet. He’s going to be Emperor someday. He must conduct himself respectably at all times, in preparation for his destiny. 

He tries not to dwell on the thought that, once he becomes Emperor, he could perhaps have his own pleasure planet where he would be the sole purveyor of any wares he wished to stock it with. That’s not the kind of power he’s after; he seeks to bring order to the galaxy not for his own benefit but for the greater good. The idea of keeping a harem of the kind of big, hulking men he’s attracted to is a fantasy that he tries to restrict to his healthy but not overzealous masturbation schedule. He will not permit himself to think about it now, as his transport pulls up to the Academy, and he’s certainly not envious of whatever depraved acts his fellow lieutenants are getting up to at the moment. Possibly it was unwise to skip his usual wank this morning, but he had to wake at 03:00 to make the shuttle to Arkanis, and later he’ll be able to wank in the bedroom where he first tried it out, when he was home from the junior Academy and desperate to touch himself after hearing about it nonstop from his fellow students during his first year there. It was undignified to do it in the dormitory and unthinkable in the communal showers. Hux had waited. Perhaps the memory of that delayed gratification is why he’s thinking obsessively about jerking off as he arrives here, at the place where he spent so much time denying himself. 

It’s raining, of course. Hux is glad for the icy blast that soaks him on the jog from the transport to the Academy’s massive front doors. He was in need of a cold shower. He dries off as best he can in the front lobby, enjoying the main building’s familiar scent of polished wood and old stone. His time at the Academy was mostly good, despite the lack of sexual release that he associates with this place. 

A protocol droid leads him to his father’s office, where all inconvenient thoughts of sex evaporate. Hux shakes Brendol’s hand and basks in his approving look when he steps back to observe Hux in a lieutenant's uniform for the first time. If only the rain hadn’t messed up his hair. Hux had it regulation perfect when he left the ship this morning.

“This is an occasion for midday brandy,” Brendol says. Hux pretends not to be shocked and accepts a small pour in a crystal glass. “To the Order,” Brendol says when he lifts his own glass. They toast and drink. Hux tries to match his father’s easy swallow and ends up coughing. “I’ve got some exciting news on that front,” Brendol says, smiling as if he didn’t notice the cough. 

“On which front?” Hux asks, and he takes a second sip more carefully.

“On progress for the Order. My stormtrooper factory is now fully operational.” 

“Excellent,” Hux says. Though he knows his father is only using ‘factory’ as a euphemism, he can’t help but picture an assembly line with droids putting stormtrooper heads onto stormtrooper bodies. “Congratulations,” he adds when Brendol pours himself a shallow refill. 

“That old man who helped me fund it wants a tour,” Brendol says. “He’s arriving today. I thought you might like to join us and see the place for yourself.” 

“Really?” Hux flushes with pleasure at the thought of walking at Brendol’s side past those neat ranks of troopers, an entire army that his father personally revolutionized. “Yeah, I mean-- Of course, sir.” 

Within the hour they have boarded a much nicer transport than the one that brought Hux from the station, and it zips through the rain heading north, toward the Institute. The name was Brendol’s idea, just as everything else about dumping the uninspired old clones had been. The stormtroopers are meant to think of the Institute as their own sort of Academy, so they can take some pride in their training. It’s important, according to Brendol. Hux understands his reasoning perfectly. He’s always seen eye to eye with his father on all matters, which earned him few friends during his Academy days but has otherwise never steered him wrong. 

“Here we are,” Brendol says, not bothering to conceal his excitement as they pull up to the main building of the Institute. It’s an enormous cement block, mostly unadorned, except for the Order’s insignia emblazoned on the front like a warning. The sight of it in the rain gives Hux a shiver that he writes off as shared excitement over this massive, imposing structure.

“It looks quite impenetrable,” Hux says, and for the first time since he stepped into his father’s office his mind returns, briefly and without permission, to thoughts of sex. 

“I’d pity the unlucky battalion that tries to poke this beehive,” Brendol says as their transport slides into an armored garage. “The standing troops are already quite deadly. Nothing like those watery clones with their poor aim and bland disposition. Might as well have been droids. These troops are trained to fight passionately for our cause. They love the Order. We feed them all kinds of propaganda about how brutal and lawless the Outer Rim worlds they were taken from are,” he adds, more quietly.

“And it’s true,” Hux says. Brendol smirks. 

“Mostly true,” he says. 

Hux wouldn’t know. He was secreted away to his grandparents’ house when his parents went into hiding in the Outer Rim. Hux had been four years old. His father returned three years later. His mother did not return. 

The Institute is lively with organized activity when they pass into its main hall. Stormtroopers march behind their captains and officers flit here and there, making observations. The officers all greet the Commandant with respect, most of them nodding to Hux as well. It’s obvious that he’s Brendol’s son, though Brendol is heavy-set and Hux has, as he prefers to think of it, yet to fill out. It’s the hair that gives their relation away. 

“This will only be the second time I’ve met this odd old fellow in person,” Brendol says as they march toward the interior of the building and their meeting with Brendol’s somewhat mysterious financier. “He’s strange, but intelligent. Try not to stare at the scars.” 

“The scars?” Hux suppresses the urge to raise his lip. He doesn’t like seeing evidence of disfigurement. Those kinds of injuries are kept out of sight in First Order society. 

“I’m not even sure he’s human,” Brendol says. “All I know is that he’s overflowing with credits and quite invested in working with the Order to see the stormtrooper program succeed.” 

“Well,” Hux says. “What more could we ask of him?” 

“Trust would be nice,” Brendol says. 

Of course: Hux feels stupid for that comment now, and he nods. 

“But, as you know, that’s a very scarce resource in this galaxy.” 

“Yes, sir,” Hux says, glad to have not been more directly rebuked. “I do know that.”

He appreciates that he at least has a powerful father he can trust. Many people have much less. Sometimes Hux laments his lack of friends, but he ultimately sees this as a sign of his destiny. The future Emperor of the galaxy bears a heavy burden that few can understand, and once he attains that level of power others will want things from him and will try to win his favor to get them. It’s best to practice keeping people at a distance early on, lest he be fooled by efforts to seduce him with offers of friendship at some point in the future, when his seducers’ real goal will be angling to share or usurp his power. 

“There he is,” Brendol mutters, drawing Hux’s thoughts back to the present. 

Ahead of them in the corridor that leads to the indoor training facilities stand two figures in black cloaks. Though they’re out of the rain now, only one of them takes down his heavy hood as Brendol and Hux approach. Hux almost laughs out loud when the removal of this hood reveals the face of an awkward teenager who gives them a humorless stare. Surely he’s not the mysterious dignitary with loads of credits. He has wavy dark hair that’s shamefully in need of a cut, almost hanging to his shoulders. Something about the size and shape of his lips also seems out of place and in need of correcting. 

“Master Snoke,” Brendol says, addressing the figure who is still hooded, only the grim line of his unsmiling mouth visible. His skin appears to be gray, which would indicate a non-human, though perhaps it’s just the shadows. “Welcome to our Institute,” Brendol says. “I hope you’re pleased with the result of our combined efforts.” 

“I am,” Snoke says. 

Though the hood is covering his eyes, Hux feels as if Snoke’s piercing attention is focused upon him in a way that makes him want to shrink behind his father like a child. Hux glances at the silent teenager beside Snoke, who meets Hux’s eyes with a kind of angry heat that directly contrasts Snoke’s calm frigidity. 

“This is my apprentice,” Snoke says. “Kylo Ren. He shall accompany us on the tour of the facility.” 

“Very well,” Brendol says. “This is my son, Lieutenant Hux. He’ll be joining us, too.” 

Snoke falls into step with Brendol as they move into the heart of the facility, utilizing high bridges that look down on the stormtroopers’ training areas and living quarters. Brendol describes the program and Snoke listens in silence. Hux tries to listen, too, but it’s hard to concentrate as he trails behind his father and Snoke, with Kylo Ren walking beside him. They’re about the same height and around the same age. Ren slouches and smells faintly of mildew, though it’s possible that scent is coming from Snoke, or from both of their cloaks. 

“These are the classrooms,” Brendol says when they’re looking down at a room where the lights have been dimmed, twenty stormtroopers sitting and watching a video about the glory of the Order’s plans. “We mostly use holo projections to instruct them on matters such as this,” Brendol says. “Combat training is more hands-on, of course.” 

“Of course,” Snoke says. It’s the first time he’s spoken since the tour began. Kylo Ren has remained completely silent. Hux glances at him periodically, waiting for him to look back. He wonders what Ren is apprenticing in, exactly. 

Brendol walks them past the dining room, where stormtroopers remove their helmets during mealtimes. Hux wants to stop and peer at them, fascinated by all the different hair colors and noses, and by the accents that drift up toward the bridge, most of them spoken at a reasonable volume. Brendol and Snoke aren’t interested in lingering here, and Hux matches their pace, not wanting to appear overly interested. Kylo Ren seems bored, or maybe it’s exhaustion. He has bags under his eyes. He keeps his gaze focused on his Master at all times. 

The only moment during the tour when Ren shows any hint of interest is when they peer down through a viewport at the nursery program. Future stormtroopers sit in circles around protocol droids that have been modified to look friendly as they give the children basic instructions on reading and any other simple mechanics they may need to become efficient soldiers. Ren walks up to the viewport, so close that the point of his big nose almost touches it. He’s frowning down at the scene as if he disapproves.

“And you remind them frequently how lucky they are to have been discovered by the Order?” Snoke says. 

“Of course,” Brendol says. “We remind them that there’s a thriving slave trade on the Outer Rim planets, and that children of less fortunate birth are particularly vulnerable to the abuses inherent to that system. Here they’re protected, well-fed, reasonably educated. Stormtroopers are allowed to retire at sixty, and we take care of them if they’re injured in combat. Will a slaver do any of that? And so on.” 

“And they respond well to this logic?” 

“Ninety-eight percent of them, yes. The other two percent can enjoy the comforts of the spice mines if they prefer.” 

Snoke makes a sound under his breath that may have been a laugh. Hux glances at Kylo Ren, who is still watching the children below intently. He has sad eyes. Perhaps he was rescued from an Outer Rim slaver himself. Perhaps he was purchased, as Snoke’s slave.

Ren turns abruptly, glaring. Hux takes a step backward without meaning to, alarmed by the sudden rage in Ren’s eyes. Ren’s gaze softens almost apologetically before he turns back to look at the nursery, and he lingers at the viewport as Brendol and Snoke move on. 

“Keep up,” Brendol says, turning back when he realizes that Ren and Hux have fallen behind. Hux hurries to obey. Ren follows. His footsteps are distractingly heavy, and Hux doesn’t like the feeling of having Ren’s eyes on his back. 

They’re heading down to the lower levels when Hux somehow misses a step on the steep durasteel staircase. He feels a bit as if he’s been pushed, though not by Kylo Ren, who is well back of Hux when he begins to fall. Hux trips forward and almost crashes into his father, who would then be knocked into frail old Snoke, causing complete disaster. Fortunately, and then frighteningly, Hux somehow manages to freeze in mid-fall, held in place by something invisible and very strong. Ren hurries toward him, and his gloved hands come to Hux’s waist, easing him back into normal gravity as Snoke and Brendol reach the bottom of the staircase, chatting obliviously about bulk blaster purchasing. 

“Careful,” Ren says, his voice soft and deep behind Hux’s ear. Hux pushes Ren away as soon as he’s regained control of himself, nearly falling again before he braces himself against the railing. He stares up at Ren, wide-eyed and shaking. 

“What just--” 

“The Force,” Ren says. “You were going to fall and crash into them. I caught you.”

“That’s not real,” Hux says, though he can’t deny that it must be, because every part of him is still tingling with the sensation of being held in place by a powerful energy, then released. 

Ren holds Hux’s startled gaze for a moment longer, then moves past him. The air around Ren smells suddenly like something electric, or like a recently doused fire. It’s the scent of raw power, Hux realizes, and he watches Ren descend the remainder of the stairs, his cloak trailing behind him in a way that now seems less eccentric and more regal. A different sort of tingling sensation shifts into the pit of Hux’s stomach and surges outward, making his grip on the railing tighten. 

Hux is in a daze for the remainder of the tour, jumpy with the fading sensation of having been held firmly in Ren’s invisible grip. He can’t stop looking at Ren in the aftermath, now noting every dark spot on his strangely appealing face. Ren’s expression remains impassive as he avoids returning these looks, but Hux can feel a kind of lively attention settling over him. It’s an alarming but not unpleasant feeling, making the hair at the back of Hux’s neck stand up. The Force? He wonders if Ren was reading his thoughts before, at the viewport that looked over the nursery.

“This is all satisfactory,” Snoke says when they return to the main lobby. He still hasn’t removed his hood. “Continue your work here, Commandant. I will contact you again in due time.” 

“The Order is grateful for your support,” Brendol says. Hux can hear something tight in this remark, probably because Brendol takes offense, like Hux does, at the term ‘satisfactory’ being applied to something so impressive in scale as the Institute.

Snoke takes his leave, Kylo Ren following behind him without a look back at Hux. As soon as they’re gone, Brendol snorts and elbows Hux. 

“Sometimes you have to get in bed with freaks to get what you need from the galaxy,” Brendol says. “Sad but true. Come on, I want to show you something.” 

Hux follows his father, trying not to dwell on the phrase ‘in bed with freaks.’ Obviously it wasn’t literal. He wonders if he should mention to his father that Kylo Ren is a Force user. It seems like important information, but Hux doesn’t want to embarrass himself by telling Brendol something he already knows. 

“This is the central operating room of the entire Institute,” Brendol says when he unlocks a door that opens on a control room filled with large data screen monitors. The monitors show different areas of the building, stormtroopers and future stormtroopers moving about in an orderly fashion on all of them. There’s also an enormous viewport which looks down on the main training area that they passed earlier. Brendol puts his hand on Hux’s shoulder as they stand there together, watching two troopers in full armor facing off in hand to hand combat at the center of the training arena. “This is your legacy,” Brendol says. “When I’m gone, I want you to oversee the Institute. I know you don’t want to teach, that you’ll always be an active officer, but I hope you’ll accept this responsibility.” 

“Of course,” Hux says. He almost adds the customary ‘sir,’ but the warm look on his father’s face stops him. Hux flushes and clasps his hands behind his back. “But. Dad-- You’re not going anywhere, are you?”

Brendol laughs. Hux tries to laugh, too, but the four-year-old weakling who still cowers between his ribs braces himself to hear that Brendol has some reason to go into hiding again. 

“No, no,” Brendol says, squeezing Hux’s shoulder. “I only meant in the distant future, when you’re an old man like me.” 

“Oh,” Hux says, nodding, relieved. “When you retire. Yes, thank you-- I’d be honored to take over someday.” 

“I trust you’ll make me proud,” Brendol says, and he crosses his arms over his chest, watching as one stormtrooper overpowers the other, then helps his defeated comrade up. 

“Something I should mention,” Hux says, deciding that it’s worth possibly being embarrassed by repeating redundant information or having his father doubt that Hux felt something real when he was caught on the stairs. “About Snoke-- That apprentice of his is a Force user.” 

“I assumed as much,” Brendol says, his gaze still focused on the training arena. “Snoke is deep into that mystical shit.” 

“And you’re okay with that?” Hux asks, surprised. Brendol shrugs. 

“At this stage, the Order has to take whichever friends we can get, and especially those with big credit accounts,” he says. “Including hooded old creeps who travel around with teenage boys and claim to do magic.” 

“That boy was strange,” Hux says, not liking the implication that Snoke is the particular kind of creep who is associated with keeping the company of young boys. “You think-- Is he Snoke’s slave? In-- That sense?”

“Who knows,” Brendol says, and he grimaces as if he finds the subject distasteful, which makes Hux regret bringing it up. “That’s their business. All I know is that I’d like to continue taking advantage of Snoke’s financial support while keeping his religious beliefs as clear out of the picture as possible, which hasn’t been an issue so far.” 

Brendol has to return to the Academy for the Advanced Interstellar Combat Strategy class he teaches for the upperclassmen in the afternoons. He sends Hux to the estate in a different transport, promising to be home for dinner. Hux is glad to reach the house, though the cavernous foyer seems cold and unfriendly when he arrives there alone, most of the rooms dark and all of the windows blasted with rain. Hux takes his uniform off in his room and hangs it up in the closet, brushing his hand over his coat until it’s perfectly neatened. He leaves the lights off and gets directly into bed, making no pretense of doing anything beyond having an overdue wank and taking a nap. While he’s glad not to be rollicking mindlessly with his fellow lieutenants, he’s going to at least indulge himself a little on this shore leave.

Under the blankets, he shoves down his shorts and pumps his cock until he’s fully hard, which doesn’t take long. The smell of these sheets always gets him going, reminding him of that first break from the Academy, when he spent a perhaps overindulgent amount of time touching himself in this bed, finally understanding why his classmates were obsessed with making stupid remarks about this act. He slides his other hand beneath the hem of his undershirt and rubs his palm over his chest, eyes closed, waiting for his mind to settle on one of the shameful fantasies he’s secreted away over the years. Being held down and taken by a conquering enemy is a reliably arousing one, though he doesn’t understand why, as it’s not something his rational mind wants at all. His best theory is that these mental images are appealing because they represent the opposite of his practical desires, and therefore his impractical, lust-driven mind is activated and entertained, as if it’s the opposite side of a switch, flipped into action when he touches himself and imagines some larger man’s weight pressing down upon him, one fat cock sliding between his lips while the hot flesh of another fills his helplessly exposed ass. 

Hux turns his cheek against his pillow and moans, tightening his grip on his cock when his thoughts slide sideways, to the memory of Kylo Ren’s uncommonly fascinating features. Ren’s lips had been positively obscene. Hux blames the Force hold that had prevented him from tumbling down the stairs for this preoccupation, and allows himself to imagine being locked into something like that while gloved hands roam all over his body, touching him everywhere. Hux thinks of the heady scent of Ren’s power that clogged the air after he used it to keep Hux still. It was an uncomfortably intimate power, like the scent of another man’s come. 

What’s it like when a Force user comes? Would the energy in the room throb along with his spurting cock? Would Hux’s whole body ripple with impact at the feeling of someone like Ren unloading in his ass? Hux groans, coming hard and not sparing a thought for the blanket he spills onto. The laundry droids will have no opinion about it.

He shoves the blanket away and rolls onto his side, tipping his chin up to look at the rain that slides over the window above his bed. A prick of guilt needles him as the haze of his orgasm wears away. He doesn’t normally fantasize about real people. It’s disrespectful and embarrassing, and what if that wretched Ren really is his master’s sex slave? Hux wrinkles his nose the way his father did and pushes the thought away. Why would someone with those kinds of powers submit to anyone? He decides the idea is stupid, and instructs himself to forget Kylo Ren. 

It doesn’t work, and by dinnertime it has occurred to Hux that he’s never had to instruct himself to forget anyone before, aside from his mother. He tries to concentrate on his father’s talk of plans for the Order, the Academy, the Institute. There’s much to be done and no time for idle preoccupations, but later that night, alone in bed, Hux again succumbs to fantasies about what it would feel like to fuck a Force user. 

 

**


	2. Chapter 2

The following year, not long after his twentieth birthday, Hux is doing reconnaissance work with two other lieutenants when a captain shows up to tell him that he’s being pulled from the mission for reasons that aren’t performance-related. Hux is mortified, despite this clarification, and he holds in his questions until they’ve reached the captain’s shuttle. Before Hux can ask anything, and as soon as the shuttle’s door has sealed behind them, the captain turns on his heel and says he’s very sorry to relay the news that Commandant Brendol Hux was found dead in his office at the Academy of apparently natural causes. 

“A heart attack,” the captain says when Hux stares at him, fighting the urge to strike a superior officer. He’s tempted to take this as a personal assault, a betrayal, high treason. “We’re going to Arkanis directly,” the captain says. “So you can attend the funeral.” 

The day that follows doesn’t feel like a day at all. It’s like a blurred nightmare that Hux can’t fight his way out of, and suddenly he’s standing on Arkanis in the soaking rain, amid a group of uniform-clad mourners who all peer down at the hole in the ground that Hux’s father’s coffin is being lowered into. Nobody cries. Public displays of emotion are frowned upon on Arkanis, even in circumstances such as these.

Hux wants to scream and protest. Though he can’t put his finger on exactly why, he feels his father’s death is not being handled according to protocol. Someone has broken the chain of command. Hux didn’t even get to say goodbye. This can’t be real. 

He hates all the condolence offerers who approach him as grave digging droids cover Brendol’s plot with mud that slops down over the coffin with a horrible sound that is all Hux can hear, drowning out the insincere words of the officers and cadets who will be jockeying for new assignments in the absence of the late Commandant. Hux can see an opportunistic glimmer in every pair of eyes that meets his, and he’s almost snarling by the time he storms away from the crowd, abandoning his umbrella and letting the rain pour down onto him, chewing his tongue hard to keep from breaking down completely. 

“Hux.” 

The voice that calls out to him from behind a massive old tree at the corner of the graveyard is unnervingly familiar and alien all at once. Hux turns, and he feels struck by the sight of Kylo Ren in his black cloak, standing alone and somehow not wet, despite the fact that he also lacks an umbrella and has put his hood down to show Hux his face. The rain bounces off the area immediately around Ren as if he’s willfully propelling it away, and of course he is. The fucking Force.

“What do you want?” Hux asks, barking this over the sound of the rain as Ren moves closer. 

“Snoke sent me to offer our condolences,” Ren says. Unlike the others who approached Hux after the funeral, Ren makes no pretense of gentle sympathy when he says this, though he also doesn’t seem to be secretly plotting. He’s simply stating a fact. The blankness of him is a relief, though it’s strange to see him at all, as Hux hasn’t heard a word from his father about Snoke in many months. 

And he’ll never hear a word from his father again. 

This strikes Hux like blaster fire as Ren expands his Force-generated rain protection to cover Hux as well, leaving Hux wet and shivering but free from being soaked further. 

“Fine,” Hux says, listless and suddenly aware of how tired he is. “Thank you.” 

“It’s our understanding that you are now in charge of the stormtrooper program,” Ren says. “According to your father’s wishes.” 

“I suppose.” That’s just another aspect of this nightmare that continues to feel too surreal to process. “I mean-- Yes. Of course I am. He wanted that.” 

“We’re aware. Generally, your father was our point of contact for cooperating with the Order. I hope you’ll be willing to fill his shoes in that respect.” 

“I will,” Hux says, searching Ren’s eyes. Ren seems somehow younger than he did a year ago, or maybe just less exhausted than he was at the Institute that day, for whatever reason. “How old are you?” Hux asks. 

“Sixteen,” Ren says.

“Really.” 

Something about this calms Hux for the first time since hearing of his father’s death. This powerful person is still a child, four years younger than him. 

“I thought you were my age,” Hux says, guiltily recalling his fantasies about sex with a Force user.

“I’ve been told I have an old soul.” 

Ren doesn’t seem to like it when Hux snorts. 

“There’s a gazebo over there,” Ren says, pointing to a stone structure with a domed roof. “If you want to get out of the rain.” 

“You’re doing a good enough job of keeping it off me.” Hux looks up to see raindrops pinging away from the invisible shield Ren has created over both of them. “How do you do that?”

“I just concentrate. It’s easy.” 

“How did you become Snoke’s apprentice?” 

“Snoke chose me.” 

“Why?”

“Because I’m uniquely powerful.” 

“Ah. That must be nice.” 

Ren shrugs one shoulder, suddenly looking like a normal kid. “Sometimes,” he says. “Do you want to stand under that shelter?” He points to the gazebo. “Or do you have someplace else to be?”

“Can’t you read my mind?” Hux asks. “Or is it only a rumor that Force users can do that?” 

“We can do that. Do you want me to read your mind, or would you prefer to just answer my question verbally?”

So Ren is a smart ass. Hux didn’t expect that, and isn’t sure why it’s a relief. He sighs and walks toward the gazebo, not wanting to be at the reception at the Academy or anywhere else in this sham of a galaxy where his father no longer draws breath. Ren follows him, still keeping the rain away.

Once they’re under more traditional cover, Hux feels a kind of hovering energy depart, as if he’s removed a layer of clothing. He feels cold and tries not to visibly shiver as he stands at the gazebo’s railing, peering out at a pond in the distance. Ren stands beside him, giving him not very furtive glances and fidgeting as if he’s not sure how to proceed. 

“You really loved him,” Ren says, jerking Hux’s attention in his direction at last. 

“What?” Hux snaps, glowering. His eyes burn. 

“Your father.”

“Of course I loved my father. He gave me everything I have. When he could have just as easily given me nothing,” Hux says, allowing himself to mutter this only because Ren will have read it from his thoughts anyway. 

“I didn’t feel that way about my father,” Ren says, a sulkiness that’s almost amusing creeping into his tone. “I couldn’t wait to be parted from him.” 

“Where do you come from?” Hux asks. His tone is listless, tired, but he’s sincerely curious. Ren doesn’t answer. He’s frowning, looking at the pond now. 

“I’m not a slave,” Ren says. “Not some orphan from the Outer Rim.” 

“It bothered you that I thought so,” Hux says, remembering. His thoughts have returned to that day at the Institute with perturbing regularity over the past year. “So you don’t hate your father because he sold you to Snoke?” Hux asks. He smirks when Ren glares at him. 

“I chose to partake of Snoke’s generous offer of apprenticeship,” Ren says, rising to his full height, which is actually an inch or two over Hux’s. That may be a new development. “It’s a sacred honor,” Ren says. “You’d do well not to mock it if you want to keep us as your allies.” 

“Lighten up,” Hux says. “I’m mourning. I’m allowed to be inappropriate.” 

“Sorry,” Ren says. He appears to be serious. Hux snorts and studies Ren’s face, enjoying the fact that Ren is clearly at a loss in this particular social situation. Everyone else who has spoken to Hux about his father’s death has acted as if they know just what to say, and how to perform sympathy to a respectful but not overly personal degree. It’s refreshing to be in the presence of someone who seems to know that he’s awkward.

“Did Snoke really send you all this way just to personally console me?” Hux asks. 

“You’re important,” Ren says. He swallows, his eyebrows twitching together as if Hux laughed doubtfully at that statement. “To the Order,” Ren adds. “You’re destined to become powerful there. We’ve foreseen it.” 

“We?” Hux’s face heats with a rush of pleasure that verges on erotic. He’s been waiting his whole life to hear someone say that, but he reminds himself to remain on guard. Ren can’t be trusted, and this flattery might be in the service of some plot.

“Me and Snoke,” Ren says. He seems earnest, and Hux can’t imagine that he’s very good at misdirection. There’s something so brutally raw about him. “We’ve both had visions of the future.” Ren’s gaze has locked on Hux’s with unsettling intensity. He seems to think he’s trusting Hux with very sensitive information. “You have featured in these visions,” he says, mumbling this part, as if it’s something personal to be confessed. 

“Am I Emperor?” Hux asks before he can stop himself, exhaling this grief-hazed plea in a shaky whisper. Ren smiles, which doesn’t seem like a good sign. It’s a condescending grin, as if Hux is the amusingly strange child with delusions of grandeur. 

“I haven’t been privy to your title in these visions,” Ren says, smart-assed again. “But you command a great power in the future. I promise you that.” 

Hux sniffs and looks away, feeling as if he’s in danger of being hypnotized. As if his destiny is something bloody Kylo Ren can promise him. As if Ren has that kind of authority. 

“And where do you and Snoke fit in?” Hux asks. “I suppose you came here in the wake of my father’s death to reestablish your position in his absence, just like the rest of them?”

“No,” Ren says. “Our position remains secure.”

“Then what’s the point of consulting me?”

“I’ve been instructed to give you a token that represents our partnership,” Ren says, reaching into his robes. Hux watches him scramble to retrieve something from a hidden pocket, and he peers up at Ren in disbelief when he sees what it is.

“A necklace?” Hux says when Ren holds it up, inviting him to take it. “Snoke wants me to wear his jewelry?”

“This is the gift from Snoke,” Ren says, pointing to the piece of reddish crystal that’s secured in a tight knot by some kind of tacky leather. “I fashioned it into a wearable object myself,” Ren says, frowning as if he heard the word ‘tacky.’ “For ease of keeping it close to you. For keeping it-- on hand, I mean.” 

“What is it?” Hux asks, taking the necklace and peering at the crystal. It doesn’t appear to be a very fine or valuable gem. 

“Quintessence,” Ren says. “It’s a crystallized form of dark energy. Snoke has foreseen that it will be important to our partnership. He’s not sure how yet, but he wanted to offer this as a symbolic gesture in the meantime. It signifies that your destiny is joined with ours.” 

“Fuck,” Hux says, glancing up at Ren. “You make it sound like matrimony.” 

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Ren says, glowering now. “This is serious. It’s a high honor.” 

“Am I expected to wear this? I’d be laughed out of the Order.” 

“You can hide it under your shirt,” Ren says. “I’ve designed it so that no one will see it if they’re not meant to.” 

“Oh, so this is a magic necklace?”

“Just put it on, you ungrateful ass.” 

Hux grins, though he doesn’t relish being called an ungrateful ass by a petulant child who skulks around in a cloak. He likes seeing hints of Ren’s unchecked humanity poking out from beneath all this pageantry, however. Sighing as if it’s a great burden, Hux slips the necklace on over his head and tucks it inside his shirt. By the feel of it, the leather is of a higher quality than he expected. The crystal remains very cool against his bare skin, as if it holds an unchangeable temperature. Ren smiles when he sees Hux shiver. 

“What’s so funny?” Hux asks. “You’re nice and dry, I’m dripping.” 

“I could dry you off.” 

“What, with the Force? That sounds unseemly.” 

“It’s not. Hold still.”

Hux freezes in anticipation when Ren’s hands lift and hover around his ears. Ren’s fingers twitch toward Hux’s hair and remain there, just a whisper away from making physical contact. Hux holds his breath and watches Ren’s eyes go dark, his pupils fattening as if he’s an animal that has sighted prey.

“Wait,” Hux says, but then it’s happening: it starts at the tip of his toes, inside his boots, and moves upward rapidly, drawing a stunned gasp out of Hux. This gasp transforms into a weak moan as the feeling of being power-dried by the Force races over Hux’s crotch, stomach, nipples, and finally up along the back of his neck, shooting out from the tips of his hair like an electric charge. 

“Oh, uh.” Ren seems like he’s trying not laugh. Hux is still frozen in place, afraid to move, his breath coming in shallow pants. “I messed up your hair. Sorry.” 

“Fuck-- What--” Hux moans when he pats at his hair and finds it standing on end, crackling with static. “What have you done to me?” he asks, disliking the shake in his voice. He can’t deny that he’s dry as a bone now, and warm, but he’s also shivering even harder, his cock half-hard and his nipples pointed into aching peaks under his shirt. 

“Here, I’ll fix it,” Ren says, reaching for Hux’s hair.

“No!” Hux jumps back, patting at his hair furiously and not appreciating the barely suppressed smirk that Ren seems to understand he shouldn’t dare. “For fuck’s sake, that was-- Too much. You could have killed me!” 

“Stupid,” Ren says, laughing now. “That was nothing.” 

Hux turns away from him, humiliated by his state of shaky half-arousal and trying not to imagine just what Ren could do to him if he really put his powers to work. It occurs to Hux with a queasy lurch that even the crack of his ass has been dried, and he clenches up against this awareness, hoping that Ren isn’t reading his thoughts. 

“Are you okay?” Ren says, sounding genuinely concerned all of a sudden.

“I’m fine,” Hux says. “Unless you messed something up besides my hair.” 

“No.” Ren walks closer. Hux keeps his back turned, curling his hands into fists and trying to regain his bearings “I meant-- About your father. Will you be alone tonight?”

“Tonight-- What--” Hux considers the information he was given this morning, about returning to his division at 09:00. That does leave his evening unaccounted for. “I’ll be fine,” he says, turning to Ren. “I’ll spend the night at my father’s estate and put things in order before I return to duty.”

Ren nods. Hux continues trying to fix his hair, though it’s beyond help. 

“I’ll convey you there,” Ren says. “So that you’ll remain dry.” 

Hux is going to argue with this, and then he can’t think of a reason why he should. On the walk to Ren’s speeder, Ren again uses the Force to protect Hux from the rain. Hux tries to wrap his head around the sensation, but he doesn’t have the frame of reference to describe this feeling. It’s like a touch that spreads out from a central location and yet has no point of origin, one that is constantly shifting but never irritating. It’s comforting, he realizes, when Ren sits on the speeder and turns back, waiting for Hux to climb on. Hux can’t remember the last time he was on a speeder with his arms wrapped around the driver, but he’s pretty sure he was under ten years old and he’s certain that the driver had been his father.

“If you’d prefer to walk, I can leave you to it,” Ren says, sharply, as if he’s offended by Hux’s reluctance to climb on and take hold of him. 

Hux grunts and slings his leg over the speeder, scooting forward to brace his hands on Ren’s sides. Ren feels shockingly warm under his clothes. Perhaps he’s exerting himself physically by using the Force to provide cover from the rain. He doesn’t smell like sweat, or like mildew, when Hux curses and clings to him as they blast away from the cemetery at full speed, Ren leaning on the throttle like a lunatic. Like a teenager, Hux realizes, and he feels like he’s transformed back into one himself when he considers begging Ren to go faster, faster. He wants to get as far away from the cemetery as quickly as possible. 

Hux puts his chin on Ren’s shoulder, ducking in close to keep Ren’s hair from flying in his face, and also because it feels good to curve himself around the solid shape of someone else. When this joyride ends, Hux will have to face the rest of his life: the responsibilities of the Institute, his return to service, the prospect of having someone like Snoke for an ally. He scoots forward and squeezes his thighs against Ren’s legs, exhilarated by Ren’s reckless speed and hoping Ren will try to prolong this journey. That seems to be the plan, as Ren takes a winding path along the edge of the forest instead of the main road. 

Hux closes his eyes. When he feels the crystal under his shirt digging into his chest, pressed snugly between him and Ren, it occurs to him how truly absurd it is that some Force user made him a necklace and is now driving him around on a speeder, through a downpour that doesn’t touch them. It’s almost as absurd as the fact that his father is gone, never coming back. 

When they reach the estate, Ren drives the speeder right up to the front door. Hux climbs off, his thighs aching and the muscles in his arms and back pulled tight, legs trembling. He stands at the bottom of the stone staircase that leads up to the house’s front door, staring at Ren and fighting a prickly reluctance to be parted from him. Perhaps he just doesn’t want to be alone. 

“So, anyway,” Ren says, twisting his hands around the speeder’s steering handles, his heels braced on the ground. “He really loved you, too.” 

“Sorry?” Hux says, the sleepy sort of trance he’d begun to drift into snapping away. 

“Your father,” Ren says, peeking up at Hux before looking down at the speeder’s control panel again. “I could sense it, that day at the Institute. Through the Force. I remember it because I was jealous. I never sensed anything like that from my father. Your father thought you were the best, and that you’d do great with all your ambitions, and that you’d always make him proud. That kind of stuff. The opposite of what my dad thought about me.” 

Hux isn’t sure how he’s expected to respond to that. He feels massively intruded upon, far too exposed, and like he’s probably about to start crying, which he hasn’t done since he was four years old, that week when he’d cried until his grandfather threatened to call Brendol up on the holo and tell him that his inconvenient little bastard had instantly transformed into an incurable crybaby in his absence. 

“I cry all the time,” Ren blurts, apparently helping himself to Hux’s thoughts. 

Hux blinks, frowns, and shakes his head. “I have to go,” he says. “There’s-- I have things to do.” 

Ren shrugs and fires up the speeder, backing it away from the stairs. Overhead, the film of Force energy that was protecting Hux from the rain dissipates, and without it he’s soaked through in seconds. 

“Master Snoke will be in touch with you soon,” Ren says, shouting this over the rain like a threat before he speeds away, going even faster than he did while Hux clung to him.

Hux is greeted by a housekeeping droid when he walks into the house. He barks at it to leave him alone when it asks if he needs a towel. Upstairs, Hux hurries past his own room and breaks into a full run as he dashes through his father’s bedroom door. 

“Dad?” Hux says, shouting. Some desperate, insane, exhausted thing in him actually hopes for a response. The fireplace is lit and the bed is turned down. Has no one told the droids that Brendol is dead? 

Hux peels off his uniform and drops it on the floor. He crawls into his father’s massive bed in his undershirt and shorts, curls up under the heavy blankets and waits to start sobbing. Nothing comes; he’s forgotten how to cry. He thinks about Kylo Ren. ‘I cry all the time.’ Did he really say that? Was Hux imagining things? What is Snoke doing to the poor fool that’s making him cry so often?

Hux reaches up under his shirt and wraps his fist around the necklace Ren made for him, the crystal cool and hard against his palm. Thunder shakes the frame of the house. Hux wishes he wasn’t alone, and he opens his eyes when he feels a throb of energy that seems to come from the crystal, like an answering promise that he won’t be alone forever.

He tells himself he’s imagining things, but he falls asleep still clutching the crystal, and he dreams of a weapon ten times the size of the Death Star. 

 

**


	3. Chapter 3

Four years later, Hux is sitting behind a crumbled stone pillar on Lasan, vaguely aware of the sound of blaster fire drawing closer as he watches beams of deadly energy streak by from the corners of both his eyes, cutting their way through the dust from the explosion. His ears are ringing and his right hand is useless, at least two fingers broken. He lifts his blaster with his untrained left hand, trying to blink the heavy grit from his eyes. He was knocked out in the explosion, but he’s fairly confident that he is only First Order personnel present who is not already dead or dying, though it’s likely that’s about to change, as the Lasanian troops behind him are drawing closer. 

Ahead of him, through the swirling dust, another figure emerges. Probably a commanding officer: he wears all black and has a mask, like the other attackers, to keep from inhaling the debris from the blast. Hux aims his weapon, only to have it instantly ripped out of his hand by someone who is apparently standing right behind him. Before Hux can turn, the masked person who stomps toward him ignites a kind of flamethrower and dashes forward to slash it across the chest of an attacker to Hux’s left, then another who comes from the right. So apparently he’s not a Lasanian commander. Hux cowers, confused, and squints at what’s not actually a flamethrower as its smooth red beam cuts through the sooty air with a kind of brutal grace. It’s some kind of laser sword-- lightsaber? --and Hux waits for it to pass through his neck. He’s weaponless and still so disoriented from nearly being blown up that he’s barely registered that this is the probably the moment when he dies. 

“Get up,” the masked figure says, sounding like a man, though it might just be an effect of the vocoder. “More troops are coming.” 

“What--” Hux says, not sure he’s hearing properly. He looks to his left and then to his right. All of the Lasans that had rushed in to attack after the blast are dead amid the rubble. 

Hux is yanked up and tucked against the masked man’s side. He’s a man: Hux is certain of it now, though he’s not entirely sure where this certainty comes from. It’s something about his familiar black cloak, or the hulking way that he walks, or the smell of raw power in the air as they flee the blast site together. Not until they’re aboard a junky shuttle does Hux dare to allow his hope that this could be Kylo Ren to solidify, and only when they’ve left the atmosphere of Lasan does Ren stalk back into the shuttle’s main bay to remove his helmet, the sight of his broody face pulling an embarrassing exhale of relief from Hux. There’s naked astonishment surging through Hux, too, and he’s sure Ren can sense it on him when he comes closer, looming large and still somewhat frightening, despite the removal of that mask. Though they’ve spoken by holo on occasion, this is the first time Hux has seen Ren in person since the day of Brendol’s funeral. Ren has gotten a lot broader since then, and possibly even taller.

“Your hand,” Ren says, holding his gloved palm out. “Let me see it.” 

Hux withholds his questions and does as asked, still experiencing a gut-churning inability to catch up with the things that keep happening so quickly. He’d been in attendance at a dinner that was supposed to be boring, a routine opportunity to meet with local leadership prior to offering the Order’s military support to help squash the stirrings of civil unrest. Between the soup and the fish course came the explosion, and Hux is half-expecting to wake from the comfort of this dream about Ren and find himself in chains in some Lasan rebel’s dungeon.

“This can be fixed with a bacta pad,” Ren says, speaking softly as he rubs his thumb across Hux’s trembling, bloody palm. “Where else do you hurt?” 

Ren looks up into Hux’s face and seems taken aback by Hux’s expression, as if Hux has answered: _everywhere_. Hux has seen combat before, but that was two years ago, and much more civilized than this.

“All the others are dead,” Hux says, thinking of Lieutenant Torc, the only one along on this mission whom Hux really liked. He’d had a tattoo on the underside of his tongue, something that was done on his home planet to prove bravery. “Aren’t they?”

“Sorry,” Ren says, though he seems more irritated by this remark than anything else. “You were the priority rescue.” 

“Priority-- Who ordered this?”

Hux knows the answer as soon as he’s heard himself ask. He feels like his rational mind was injured in the blast and is now limping, unable to keep up with even the most basic information. He’s on a shuttle with Kylo Ren. All the officers who accompanied him to Lasan are dead. Somebody detonated a bomb in the ambassador’s mansion. 

“Snoke had a vision,” Ren says, standing and moving away from Hux. He goes to a cabinet on the wall and begins rifling through supplies. “I was instructed to retrieve you.” 

“Did he have a vision regarding who was behind this attack?” Hux asks, unable to keep a cynical edge from creeping into his tone. “Because that would be very useful.”

Ren doesn’t answer. Hux takes that as a no. They’re both scowling a bit when Ren returns to Hux, peeling a bacta pad from its sterilized packaging. 

“You’re welcome,” Ren says as he wraps the pad around Hux’s hand. 

“Can those things really heal broken bones?” Hux asks, ignoring the prompt to express gratitude.

“Your bones aren’t broken. Tendons and muscles were damaged. This will fix it.”

“You’re like a medical droid."

Ren gives him a wounded look that was probably meant to convey anger. 

“Well, I am grateful,” Hux says, sharply. “It’s just a lot to process in a short space of time. Where are we going, by the way?”

“To Snoke,” Ren says, and he stands, moving away as the bacta pad begins to tighten intelligently around Hux’s injuries, getting to work. 

Hux is ashamed of the fear he feels upon hearing that they’ll be having an audience with Snoke. He’s also ashamed of the botched mission, though it was sabotaged in a seeming unforeseeable way. Hux’s superiors are the ones who might have caught wind of the plot, but he still feels guilt about the officers and troopers who died, mostly because he is somehow alive, and safe enough for now, aboard Ren’s shuttle.

“Why are we going to Snoke?” Hux asks. “He wants to see me?” 

“Things are progressing. Your involvement is part of that progress.” 

“Can you be a little more vague? It’s not as if I’m still suffering from shock or anything.” 

“I thought you might be." Ren half-turns from the cockpit. “But your mental processes are surprisingly steady. You’re--” He seems to consider whether he should confess something. “Tougher than you look,” he says, muttering this as he turns back toward the shuttle’s viewport.

Hux tries to rally with a cutting response, but suddenly he’s very tired. It’s a side-effect of the painkillers the bacta pad is pumping into his system, surely. He slumps down onto the cot and closes his eyes, taking a deep breath that feels like the first one he’s dared since the explosion seemed to knock the entire galaxy sideways. He can hear Ren making adjustments on the shuttle’s console, and the presence of him is as comforting as the idea of having an audience with Snoke is disquieting. 

“Ren?” Hux says, slurring this against the mattress of the cot. 

“Yes?” 

“I’ve still got it,” Hux says, clawing at his neck until he finds the leather strap of the necklace he always wears, always miraculously unseen. He tugs at it weakly, until the crystal pops out. Hux’s vision is blurry when he blinks at Ren, who has swiveled the shuttle’s pilot seat around so he can see what Hux is mumbling about. 

“I know,” Ren says. 

“Right.” Hux snorts. “The Force. Haven’t got to tell you anything, eh?”

“You’re not always so easy to read,” Ren says, and then Hux is asleep, cradled by pain relief and general disorientation. 

Hux wakes up on a different bed, in an unfamiliar room, wearing strange clothing. 

He sits up slowly and tries to reel his thoughts in before panic can send him spiraling. His last concrete memory is of Kylo Ren, somehow. There was a shuttle, a hasty escape from a deteriorating situation, a deadly explosion. Once Hux has reordered these events, he forms a hypothesis about where he is now: Snoke’s residence, the walls made of stone and the furnishings very simple, a heavy door closed and probably locked, a single window showing the deepening purple of late evening on an unfamiliar planet. 

As he puts all the pieces together, it occurs to him that Ren must have carried him here from the shuttle. And then, what-- Undressed him? Hux looks around for his uniform, which was ruined in the explosion. At the thought that Ren might have gone, leaving him here alone with Snoke, Hux shivers and reaches for the blankets on the bed, which someone draped over him at some point. He tells himself that it’s unlikely that Snoke would have bothered placing blankets over him, and he sits in pensive, paralyzed silence for some time, the last of the purple light fading from the sky outside. 

A gentle light glows from across the room as night falls completely, then another. The light comes from two candles perched on sconces that frame the door. These candles have been lit by some unseen caretaker, or else they’re programmed to flame back to life at a certain hour of evening. Hux reaches instinctively for his blaster, though of course he doesn’t have it. The tunic someone has put on him is soft, black, and overly large, with long sleeves. He flexes the fingers on his right hand, healed now by the bacta pad. Someone has cleaned the blood from his skin, only they missed a few flecks that are lodged under his short fingernails, hard to reach. 

Hux hears something from beyond the door to the room. It comes from a distance: a soft creak, then nothing. His heart pounds, and he wonders what his superior officers are doing right now. Pronouncing him dead? What if this is all by Snoke’s and Ren’s design, some sort of plot to get Hux alone and hold him ransom or keep him here forever? Perhaps Snoke and Ren plan to take over the Order, though it seems like they would have narrowed their efforts to a more senior officer, if that were the case. There is the matter of the Institute, of course, and with Hux out of the way it could most easily fall into the wrong hands, though it’s possible he’s overestimating his influence, as most in the Order see young Hux’s position as Chairman of the Institute as a mere kindness that was extended toward him following the death of his father--

Hux’s mind is still racing when the door opens, and it takes his mental faculties some time to catch up with what he’s seeing: Kylo Ren, slipping quietly into the room and shutting the door behind him, wearing nothing but a long loincloth made of some fine black material. He’s not even wearing shoes. 

“What,” Hux manages, when Ren stands sheepishly near the door. 

“How are you feeling?” Ren asks. 

“What are you _wearing_?” Hux returns. “And what-- What am I wearing, for that matter? What’s happened? How long was I out? What is this place?”

“This is Snoke’s home,” Ren says. 

Hux scoffs. It seems absurd that the old ghoul should have such a thing. Ren frowns, probably having intercepted that thought. 

“You’re our guest,” he says. 

“Fantastic,” Hux says, throwing the blanket away and swinging his legs over the side of the bed. He can’t deny that he’s enormously relieved to see Ren, and that his panic has mostly departed, despite the fact that he still has no idea what’s going on. “Well, as much as I appreciate your hospitality, I need to be getting back to my Commander to let him know that I’m alive and that the Lasans betrayed the Order.” 

“The leadership is aware of what happened.” 

“How?” 

“I sent a report by holo. I informed them that you were the only survivor of the ambush. They’re making plans to retaliate against Lasan. You’ll be returned to duty in the morning.” 

“And I’m to take your word on this?” Hux says, though he is inclined to believe Ren is telling the truth. 

Ren takes a step toward the bed, and the almost fluid motion of the loincloth makes Hux’s face grow hot. There is only one reason for Ren to be dressed like that, but it’s too absurd to seriously consider. 

“I’m your ally,” Ren says. “Do you not believe that?” 

“What happened to your clothes?” Hux asks, as if his answer hinges on knowing this. “Why are you wearing that-- thing?”

Ren looks down at himself as if he’s forgotten what he’s wearing. Hux uses this opportunity to set his shock aside and sincerely appreciate the cut of Ren’s body. He was already imposing four years ago, at sixteen. Now he is massive, and clearly not quite comfortable in this body that seems to take more air from the room than Ren’s lungs require. There’s an artfulness to his shape, though he’s also clumsy-looking, with those ears and that nose and his giant hands hanging at his sides. It should all really be too much, aesthetically, but he’s not without a kind of nascent grace. His arms and chest have the look of optimal strength without the barest hint of excess, and the thickness of him stops at his waist, which is still narrow in a boyish way. The loincloth exposes his muscled thighs and conceals a heavy-looking bulge that Hux has to drag his eyes away from when Ren moves closer. 

“I have a proposition for you,” Ren says.

“I was beginning to fear you did.” 

“Fear?” Ren’s face softens. “No, you don’t have to-- It has to be voluntary. If we’re to-- Undertake things.” 

“You’re making very little sense.” 

“Sorry.” Ren clears his throat and squares his shoulders, clapping his hands to his thighs as if he’s about to give a classroom presentation. “Now that I’m of age-- I’m twenty, did you know that?”

“I-- Yes, I knew. I know.” 

“Now that I’m past a certain point in the years of my training, I’m allowed to have--” Ren hesitates, swallows. “A lover.” 

Hux laughs. Ren looks angry, though not particularly threatening, even when his hands curl into fists. 

“It’s a trivial term, I know,” Ren says. “And too small for what I’m really suggesting. You’re part of our plan. I’ve sensed that you’ve had visions, too. Of a weapon.” 

“I--” Hux has to stop himself from demanding to know how Ren found out about his very private plans, the schematic sketches that he doesn’t dare to show anyone and the secret dreams about the jewel in his arsenal that will secure his destiny as Emperor, eventually. “I have some ideas,” Hux says, tightly, well aware of how Ren knows about his dreams. 

“Yes.” Ren nods once and swallows again. “Your ideas are good. Snoke has foreseen that they will be important. I feel this way, too, I feel-- That you’re important. Snoke suggested we might cement our allegiance through physical recreation and-- Comfort-taking, to increase trust. Did you know that he’s not human?” Ren adds, hurriedly, when Hux opens his mouth to respond. 

“Snoke?” Hux says. He feels as if he just blinked awake after a second explosion. Ren nods. 

“I don’t know where Snoke comes from,” Ren says. “He tells me that will be revealed to me in time. But he’s aware that humans are social, um, creatures, and that they have certain-- They get-- There are practical advantages to engaging in stress relief behaviors with another human,” Ren says, almost angrily, as if Hux is going to contest this. 

“So,” Hux says, slowly. “Snoke wants you to fuck me.” 

Ren winces at the word ‘fuck.’ This reaction should be embarrassing, but Hux finds it very endearing. Hux’s face gets hotter, and he scoots back onto the bed. He can’t remember the last time he found anyone even a little endearing.

“We don’t have to do anything specific,” Ren says. “We don’t have to do anything at all. But Snoke has identified you as an important ally, and he has sensed, in me, that-- I--” Ren’s voice trails off. He looks down at his feet. Like his hands, his feet are comically large.

“Come here,” Hux says, pitying him. Ren still seems like a kid, despite having reached adulthood and despite the fact that he could throw Hux across the room with both hands tied behind his back. Hux thinks of the almost distracted ease with which Ren devastated the attacking Lasan soldiers, and he shivers as Ren moves closer, his eyes locking on Hux’s in a hard, searching way, as if he’s warning Hux not to overestimate his vulnerability in this moment. 

Ren sits on the bed. He’s in arm’s reach, but Hux doesn’t touch him. There’s a kind of heat rolling off of Ren’s skin, and it’s scented in a way that seems deliberate. 

“Are you wearing perfume?” Hux asks, regretting it when this sounds critical. He’s sincerely curious. Ren shrugs one shoulder. 

“There’s a vine that grows near my bedroom window,” he says. “When it blooms, it smells good, and I thought-- Never mind. It’s stupid.” 

Hux moves closer, trying to discern the origin of this scent, which is heady and sweet, suffused with something darker, like a poison at the center of a lurid flower. He realizes with a punch of secondhand embarrassment that Ren must have rubbed these blossoms into his hair. He’s washed it, too; it’s smooth and silky-looking, not matted like it was when he pulled off his helmet on the shuttle. Hux’s sudden desire to touch Ren’s hair is overwhelming, as if there really is an intoxicant in the scent of that flowering vine. He wants to bury his nose in Ren’s hair and inhale deeply. It looks quite soft, up close.

Ren smirks, still staring at the floor, and Hux realizes he must have heard these thoughts. It’s infuriating, then something like a relief. Hux has never liked the push and pull of seduction and sexual negotiation. This is direct, at least, in more ways than one.

“Whose idea was that?” Hux asks, nodding to the loincloth when Ren peeks at him. “Is that on loan from Snoke’s personal collection of seductive nightwear?”

“You’re not funny,” Ren says, but he’s grinning, maybe just because he can feel Hux wanting him now. 

“That was a serious question,” Hux says when Ren moves closer to him. 

“It was my idea,” Ren says. “I thought-- I don’t know. I saw stuff on the holonet, years ago. Films, uh. There was someone dressed like this. In a bedroom scene.” 

“So you’ve never--?” Hux asks, though the answer is obvious enough now. 

“I’ve been Snoke’s apprentice since I was fifteen,” Ren says. “What do you think?”

“To be honest, and with you I might as well be, I used to worry that Snoke might be engaged in some comfort-taking of his own, with you.” 

“You used to worry?” Ren’s smile widens, and the heat on Hux’s face spreads outward, toward his ears. “Snoke isn’t interested in such things,” Ren says. He looks as if he’s trying not to laugh at Hux now. “He’s above all this. I envy him.” 

“Do you.” 

“Yes. It’s a kind of agony, isn’t it? For you, too? Or do you have lots of partners in the Order?” 

“Lots? No, I--” Hux shrugs and moves back a bit, suddenly aware that he’s been swooning in toward Ren’s big nose and heady scent, that flowery stuff mixed with something that’s just the unadorned scent of him, freshly cleaned skin after a battle where none of Ren’s own blood was spilled. “I’ve had a few partners, here and there,” Hux says, hoping that Ren won’t probe his memories. It’s been more like: two isolated incidents and one half-start that might have amounted to a third, if Hux had less pride or had been more drunk. “I know about what you call agony,” Hux says. “We try to ignore it, while in service, but it’s permitted-- We’re allowed to get each other off, if we’re discreet about it.” 

“Get each other off,” Ren repeats, as if he’s enchanted by the sound of that. There’s something newly hungry in his eyes when Hux looks up at him again. Before this moment, Hux might have agreed with Ren that anyone who doesn’t crave sex is to be envied. Now he thinks there’s probably nothing better than wanting something and daring to reach out and take it. 

“Are you cold?” Hux asks, glancing down at Ren’s stiff nipples. There are goosebumps, too, on his shoulder. 

“I’m fine,” Ren says. He’s eying Hux’s neck with scrutiny. “Can I see it?” he asks. 

“See what? Oh.” 

Hux stiffens when Ren’s fingers brush the side of his throat, poking under the collar of Hux’s oversized tunic to find the leather strap of the necklace. Ren tugs it out and slides his fingers downward, pinching the quintessence crystal between them. Hux breathes shallowly, feeling as if Ren is holding some very intimate part of his person. That crystal has been a source of strange comfort for Hux since the day of his father’s funeral. It feels like a friend, sometimes, and seeps into his dreams. He’s researched quintessence, and has made some educated guesses as to how it might be weaponized. 

“This is a dark energy,” Ren says, his voice hushed and reverent when he lifts his gaze from the crystal to Hux’s eyes. “And you have some of it in you, now.” 

“Well.” Hux swallows, glances at Ren’s lips and then back up to his eyes. “Thanks for that.” 

“You’re worthy of it,” Ren says, setting the crystal down against Hux’s chest, outside of his tunic. The tunic smells like Ren. It must belong to him. 

“So you’ve chosen me?” Hux says, not sure if he should feel more uncomfortable with this. Perhaps he will, in the morning. “As Snoke chose you?” 

“No,” Ren says, frowning. “It’s nothing like that. You’re not to be my apprentice.” 

“Obviously not, but you’re claiming to have seen something in me.” Hux wants to put a word to it: Emperor, destiny, someone who will wield unequalled power. “Unless of course you just want to fuck someone with red hair,” Hux says, trying to make a joke of it. He’s met some people who have wanted only that. 

“Your hair has nothing to do with it,” Ren says, but then he touches Hux’s left sideburn carefully, as if it does. “Though it is-- I mean. It drew my eye, once.” 

“Drew your eye,” Hux says, laughing at Ren’s choice of words, which are perhaps also from some old holo featuring a bedroom scene. 

“Shut up,” Ren says. He swoons toward Hux, then pulls back. “So will you accept our proposal?” he asks, making his face as serious as he can. 

“You mean to sleep with you? I’d prefer to consider it solely your proposal, even if you do have your master’s permission.” 

“It’s beyond that,” Ren says. “You’d be tied to me.” 

“What-- As in actual matrimony?” Hux snorts. “No, I’m not willing to swear myself to you for life, Ren. Especially not with someone like Snoke enforcing the contract.”

“I’ve told you Snoke doesn’t care about such things,” Ren says, his eyes flashing in a way that actually frightens Hux, though only briefly and on an automatic, instinctual level. “All Snoke asks of you is your loyalty as his ally in securing and managing our military-based strength. He’s given me permission to do what I want with you, meanwhile. That’s all.” 

“So how would I be tied to you?” Hux asks, disliking the idea very much. He’d like to sleep with Ren tonight, to fuck Ren’s untouched ass and bury his face in Ren’s pretty hair while riding him into the mattress, but the idea of a binding romantic arrangement of any sort is repellant at this stage of his career.

“I don’t know,” Ren confesses, after some broody silence. “Snoke just asked me to warn you not to enter into this situation lightly. Perhaps it’s something that takes place during the physical union.” 

“That’s ominous,” Hux says, his eyes raking over Ren’s body again. He’s not sure he wants this gangling, fearsome, stupidly endearing man inside him enough to risk whatever mystical bullshit comes along with it, but he doesn’t want to sleep in this room alone, and he tells himself that simply testing the physical waters can’t be too dangerous. If anything starts to feel like an unbreakable spell that’s being cast, Hux will be able to pull away in time, surely. 

He’s staring down at Ren’s chest in a state of indecision when Ren strokes his sideburn again, now with just one finger. Hux shivers and looks up. He’s annoyed by Ren’s smile, which seems to suggest that he knew Hux would fold easily into his arms. Hux would send Ren and his ridiculous loincloth right out of here if there wasn’t also something desperately anxious in Ren’s eyes. It’s genuine loneliness and the terror of being rejected, the kind of thing that can’t be faked or concealed when sitting so close to another person. 

“You’d have to show me what to do,” Ren says, stroking Hux’s sideburn again. “I’ve had no instruction. Would you like that? Showing me, I mean?”

“I think you’re asking because you know that I would,” Hux says. He slides his hand onto Ren’s thigh and suppresses the urge to moan at how warm and solid Ren is under his grip.

Ren gasps when Hux’s fingers press into his flesh, his muscles jumping as if Hux has administered a mild shock. A visible shiver moves through him, and Hux takes his hand away. 

“Sorry,” Hux says, confused. Ren shakes his head.

“It’s okay, it’s--” Ren looks away, shrugs. “I liked it. I didn’t mean to-- It’s just. New, uh. To me.” 

Hux considers this for a moment, his confusion fading. If it’s true that Snoke has no interest in such things-- a claim Hux is more than happy to accept --it’s possible no one has touched Ren at all in-- What? Five years?

“I can’t really do this without touching you,” Hux says. 

Ren glares at him. “I came into your room half-naked and asked you to be my lover,” he says. “I want you to touch me.” 

“Fine,” Hux says, also glaring. “Good.” 

“It’s not like I told you to stop.” 

Hux is going to refute that-- Body language can be far more telling than something vocalized. But when he reconsiders Ren’s reaction he decides it was probably more surprise than rejection. Ren needs to be eased into things before accepting even a gentle squeeze on his thigh. This means they’re in for a long night, but Hux is not discouraged. It could be the kind of long night he’s been craving since the first time he touched himself under his blankets. 

“Here,” Hux says, making his voice soft when he reaches for Ren’s face, turning it so that Ren is looking at him, so that Hux can read his expression as Hux’s fingers slide along his jaw, then into his hair. Ren swallows and moves closer. “It’s criminal,” Hux says, stroking Ren’s hair again. “Someone who looks like you being locked up in a sexless tower.” 

“What tower?”

Hux suppresses the urge to roll his eyes. “I was being figurative,” he says. 

“Oh. Well-- No, it’s fine. It’s good. I’ve been able to focus on more important things.” 

“That’s true,” Hux says, thinking of his own mostly sex-free career. 

“And I don’t look-- What do you mean, someone who looks like me?”

Hux is inclined to believe Ren is fishing for a compliment, but he seems suddenly irritated and has stiffened a bit, as if he’s afraid Hux is making fun of him. 

“I’ve never wanted someone so much that I was willing to risk being locked into a mystical contract with them,” Hux says, because Ren seems like he could use a few breadcrumbs of praise. “Until you, until now.” 

“So you’re going to do it?” Ren says. 

“No-- What?” 

Hux blinks what feels like a physical haze from his eyes. Affection has never acted upon him with such sinister stealth: until Ren, until now. 

“Lie down,” Hux says, pointing to the bed’s thin pillows. Ren does as asked, moving carefully, though there’s no hope of concealing his state of semi-arousal with only that loincloth to cover it. Hux is similarly affected, but the tent-like tunic he’s been dressed in is good for modesty. “We’re going to do this my way,” Hux says, crawling toward Ren, who looks somehow even bigger now that he’s spread out on his back and seemingly surrendered. 

“Your way,” Ren says, frowning. “What’s that?”

“You said I’m being returned to duty tomorrow, correct?”

“Yes. A shuttle will come.”

“Good. And does Snoke require anything of you this evening?”

“No. I mean, I don’t think so.” 

“So we’ve got all these hours to pass. I’d rather not be alone. You?”

“I’d rather not be,” Ren says softly, in agreement. 

“Good.” Hux can’t resist leaning down to peck Ren on his fat lips when they twitch into a near-pout. “So I’m going to kiss you,” Hux says, his face still hovering over Ren’s. “And you’re going to kiss me, if you can figure out how to do it. If we find that this leaves us wanting to do other things, we shall do other things. That’s all I’m committing to of my own free will. Understand?”

“Yes,” Ren says. He stays very still, as if he’s afraid any sudden movements might break the spell. 

As if Hux hasn’t been completely fucked since that day when Ren caught him on the stairs at the Institute. 

Hux has never disliked kissing, but he’s also never exactly looked forward to it. Until now. He moves slowly, his eyes open and locked on Ren’s, as he lowers his face to give him another careful peck. Ren sighs, lashes fluttering. He’s emanating warmth, all hot breath and trembling anticipation. Hux kisses him again, closing his eyes without meaning to when he feels a hopefully invisible shiver move down his spine. Ren’s lips are so, so soft. Hux doesn’t want to acknowledge the feeling that he always knew they would be, and that they would feel this good against his own, just like this. Ren’s mouth opens sweetly for the first gentle pass of Hux’s tongue. Everything about Ren is an invitation, exactly the sort of irresistible delicacy a ruthless wizard would use to tempt his prey. And yet: Hux deepens the kiss as if he’s falling gladly into a bottomless well, wanting to dive to the very bottom, not looking back. 

“Is that-- Is it okay?” Ren asks, whispering against Hux’s lips in mid-kiss. 

“Um.” Hux has to put his mind back together before he can answer. “Can’t you use the Force to tell?” he teases, stroking his thumb over Ren’s cheek. He wonders if Ren will ever not shiver for a touch like that. This time Ren also presses up into it, lifting his face for another kiss. 

“I can’t--” Ren shrugs and flops back onto the pillow. “I can’t read minds unless I concentrate,” he says, with a measure of annoyance. 

“And you can’t concentrate right now?”

“I’m really hard,” Ren blurts, and Hux has to bite back a sympathetic moan. He kisses Ren again, nodding. 

“Me too,” Hux says, in case Ren didn’t catch that, and he opens his mouth when Ren licks at him. 

Like the rest of Ren, his tongue feels too big and strong, and his efforts with it are pushy in an ironically innocent way. Hux accepts the aggressive nature of Ren’s kiss as a challenge, pushing back and pinning Ren’s shoulders to the bed, though it’s only for show. Ren could free himself from Hux’s grip if he wanted to. He must not want to; he melts under Hux and sighs into his mouth, clamping one big hand on Hux’s waist to hold him in place. 

“So you’re enjoying this?” Hux asks, when Ren is breathing in long, choppy exhales through his wet mouth, his eyes glazed. 

“Feels good,” Ren says. He slides his hand down and rests it gingerly over Hux’s ass, giving him a look that’s impish and imploring at the same time. 

“Am I wearing your shirt?” Hux asks, resisting the urge to arch back into Ren’s touch. Ren’s hand feels enormous on Hux’s ass, and the swell of his cock under the loincloth is becoming distracting. 

“Take it off,” Ren says, moving his hand to the hem of the tunic. 

“Are you avoiding my question?” Hux asks. He draws his finger from the point of Ren’s jaw down to his chin. Ren’s face makes no sense; Hux wants to kiss him everywhere, and wants to suck on the sensitive spots along the stretch of Ren’s neck until he moans. “Did you undress me?” Hux asks. “When you first brought me here?” Hux is still wearing his own underwear, at least, but it bothers him to think that Ren has already seen his naked, unimpressive chest. “Did you wash me, too?” Hux asks when Ren remains silent, allowing Hux to stroke the line of his jaw again. “Somebody must have. I was filthy, before.” 

“I used the Force,” Ren says. “I didn’t look.” 

“And you’re accomplished at undressing and bathing people using the Force?” 

“No,” Ren says, and he frowns. “I told you. I wasn’t allowed to touch anyone until I reached the proper age. Not even--”

He breaks off there, but Hux doesn’t need to Force to understand what he was going to say.

“Not even yourself?” Hux says, intending to taunt him for this. He ends up feeling too much sympathy to do so, and slides his hand down to Ren’s shoulder. Ren shrugs, defensive. 

“I did it sometimes,” Ren says, mumbling. “But it always-- I always felt like Snoke knew. And that would kill it.” 

“And him knowing that you’re here with me now is not killing it?” 

“No.” 

“Why not?”

“I don’t know.”

“You do know,” Hux says. “Tell me.” 

“Because-- Well, you’re here,” Ren says, huffy. “And obviously that’s better than just-- Me.” 

“What do you like about me?” Hux asks, not sure why he’s delaying. He’s wary of how right Ren feels beneath him like this, peering up with a measure of petulance in his trusting eyes. “If not the hair,” Hux says, flipping his disordered fringe back. “Is it just my ambition? I’ve learned that I’m hardly the only person in the Order who thinks he ought to be Emperor someday.” 

“I can’t explain it,” Ren says. “You just-- You make sense, and you don’t. It’s a good balance. Balance is important for, you know. The Force.” 

Hux feels bad for asking. Ren wants him; Hux shouldn’t make him try to explain. But he also can’t let it go, considering the circumstances. He can’t totally lose his fucking mind for this. 

“It it this thing?” Hux asks, grasping the crystal that dangles from his neck, nearly touching Ren’s chest. “Have you enchanted it with something that’s trapped me and brought me here?”

“Disaster brought you here,” Ren says. “And I felt it before I gave you the crystal.” 

“Felt what?” Hux asks, though now he’s just being deliberately obtuse. 

“The same thing you felt,” Ren says, sitting up on his elbows. “When I caught you. When you almost fell down those stairs.” 

“That’s to do with the Force, surely.” 

“Yes, of course. But do you think it would have felt the same if Snoke had used his power to catch you?”

“How should I know?” 

The crystal is touching Ren’s skin now. Hux wills it to pull something from the heat of him and keep it for later, for some moment when Hux is alone and badly in need of the memory of what’s about to happen. 

“Why are you afraid?” Ren asks. “I’m the one who’s never done this.”

“I’m not afraid,” Hux says, and it’s true, though he knows he should be.

He pushes Ren’s shoulders to the bed again, demonstrating his fearlessness, and leans down to lick Ren’s throat. Ren groans and presses his hips up, his hand tightening on Hux’s ass. Hux grins and licks him again, then sucks softly at the spot just below the point of Ren’s jaw. Ren whimpers and curses under his breath, humping the air. Hux licks along the line of his neck, slowly, savoring him. 

“You can take that thing off if you like,” Hux says, whispering this into Ren’s ear. “If you don’t mind me seeing you.” 

“What thing-- Oh.” 

They both look down at the loincloth. Ren’s hand slides off of Hux’s ass, regretfully. To move things along, Hux sits back and yanks off the tunic. He stays on his knees and lets Ren take him in as a flush spreads from his neck and down to his chest. 

“I hope you like the dead fish look,” Hux says. A classmate at the Academy had called him that. He’s gained some weight and muscle since then, but not as much as he would have liked. Ren is staring at Hux’s nipples, his mouth hanging open. Then he’s frowning.

“What?” Ren says. “No-- Come here.” 

He reaches for Hux with both hands. Hux moves forward, embarrassed by his tented underwear but not quite ready to remove them. He’s never felt like this with a partner before. He’s never felt like he had time to even look twice before getting down to business, and no one has ever touched him like Ren is touching him now, his hands moving reverently over Hux’s pale chest, as if it is something to revere. 

“You’ve got--” Ren taps his fingertip over Hux’s left nipple, where he has a patch of very light freckles. “And here,” Ren says, sliding his hand to the freckles that are scattered over Hux’s ribs. 

“They’re not from the sun,” Hux says. An idiotic comment, but he’s not sure how else to respond to whatever this is. 

“Neither are mine,” Ren says, and he smirks. 

Hux puts his hand over Ren’s chest, as envious as he is aroused by the tight, powerful muscles there. Ren must have a punishing routine, to stay so fit, and surely a genetic advantage as well. Hux traces his fingertip from one of Ren’s dark spots to another, his cock leaking into his underwear when Ren sucks in his breath as if Hux is caressing his balls. 

“Do you ever touch yourself here?” Hux asks, resting his fingertip lightly over Ren’s left nipple.

“There?” Ren is already panting, staring at Hux’s finger. “No-- Why-- Ah--”

Hux leans down, keeping his eyes on Ren’s as he presses his tongue out to flick over his nipple. Ren exhales through his nose, his hips snapping up and his eyes falling shut. 

“You were looking at mine,” Hux says, and then he licks Ren there again, drawing another choppy exhale from him. 

“Your--” 

“Nipples.” 

Ren laughs, and Hux does, too. It’s a stupid word; Hux’s face is very red. He surges up to kiss Ren on the lips again, fitting himself against Ren’s side as he does. Ren’s hand trails up over Hux’s ribs, shyly approaching a nipple. They both gasp when Ren makes contact, and Hux again feels like an idiot, but it doesn’t really matter. Idiocy seems allowed, here with Ren, and harmless, and it hasn’t dampened his arousal at all. 

“Do you still want me to take it off?” Ren asks. 

“What?”

“My breechcloth.” 

“Your--” Hux bursts into laughter. He feels bad about this when Ren’s face falls, but he’s unable to stop. “Sorry,” he says, sliding his leg onto Ren’s thigh when he tries to move away. “I’m sorry, that word is just funny. It’s like nipples, you know? _Breechcloth_ , gods above.” 

Ren isn’t laughing. “That’s what it’s called!” he says. “It’s not like nipples. It’s a perfectly normal word.” 

Hux laughs even harder, flopping over onto his back. The release of nervous tension feels good, and he’s still laughing a little when Ren sits up onto his knees and rips the loincloth away. 

Hux’s laughter dies off fast when he sees Ren’s cock. It’s bigger than Hux expected, and he was expecting something big, based on the bulge and Ren’s size in general. It’s the biggest human cock Hux has ever seen, holonet videos included, and it’s flushed dark red, so hard, wet at the tip-- for Hux, all for him. 

“Fuck,” Hux says, and he’s sits up too fast, his face nearly crashing into Ren’s dick. He stares up at Ren, who suddenly seems composed, his eyes dark and hungry. “Can I put my mouth on you?” Hux asks, his shoulders curling inward with the weight of his humiliated, desperate want. 

“Yes,” Ren says. He licks his lips, nods. “But-- Take yours off, first. They’re all wet anyway.” 

“My--” Hux looks down at his underwear and moans at the size of the visible damp that’s spread across the front. 

“Are they sticky?” Ren asks, staring. “Inside?”

“Yes,” Hux says. He reaches for the waistband. “I guess you know the feeling?”

“I do. Remember the speeder?” 

Hux considers pretending to not immediately know what Ren is referring to: that speeder ride after Brendol’s funeral, through the rain. 

“Yes,” Hux says, more softly than he intended to.

“I thought I would explode,” Ren says. His fingers are shaking a bit when he strokes Hux’s hot cheek. “You were holding on to me so tight, fuck, it felt good. I could feel your breath on my neck. I was burning up inside my clothes, and my dick was so hard-- I thought-- If I had let myself just hump the seat once, even a little, I would have come in my pants and crashed the speeder, probably.” 

“We’d both be dead by the side of the road on Arkanis,” Hux says. He pulls his underwear down before Ren can refute this, less embarrassed now to show Ren how soaked he is, precome slippery not just on the head of his cock but down along the shaft as well. 

“It would have been a good death,” Ren says, still staring at Hux’s cock. They’re both kneeling on the bed, arms pressed to their sides. It occurs to Hux that Ren has never seen another man naked before. At least not in person. He wonders if Ren watched those holonet films featuring loincloths with his big cock leaking inside his pants, painfully hard and untouched.

“I wanted to invite you in that day,” Hux says, reaching out to stroke his fingertips down Ren’s chest. He anticipates Ren’s shiver of overwhelmed, oversensitive arousal this time, and enjoys it. “Though I didn’t have sex in mind.” 

“What-- What did you have in mind?” 

“Nothing-- Company? I don’t know, forget it. I’m going to suck your cock now, if that’s all right.” 

“Yes,” Ren says, so seriously that Hux has to hold in a laugh. “Should I stay like this or lie down?”

“Lie down,” Hux says, stroking his fingers along the length of Ren’s right arm. “Maybe this is a good time to talk about what you want,” he says, having a few things in mind himself. 

“I just want you,” Ren says, and he flops onto his back again. This statement makes him seem very young, and for a moment Hux feels guilty for almost literally drooling over his need to get Ren’s cock into his mouth. Then Ren spreads his legs, touches his cock and lifts his hips, and Hux falls onto him. 

“I mean--” Hux says, putting his hands on Ren’s spread-apart knees. “I mean, do you-- What have you fantasized about?” he asks, instead of _Can I put my fingers up your ass while I choke on your cock?_ Which is what he’s really wondering. 

“Oh.” Ren turns his cheek on the pillow and looks at the window, his knees twitching under Hux’s hands. “Mostly, uh. Stuff like-- Like what we did on the speeder.” 

“What we did?” Hux strains to conceive of anything that happened that day as a sex act. “What-- In a dream you had, or something?” He’s flattered, but Ren snorts and frowns, shakes his head.

“No, what we really did. The way you just. Clung to me. So hard, like. Like you never wanted to let me go.” 

“I didn’t,” Hux says, his heart plummeting down the bottomless well of Ren along with the rest of him. “Could you feel that? Through the Force?”

“No.” Ren snorts and starts to pull his thighs together, then lets them fall open again. “I told you. When I’m like this, I can’t read minds.” 

“Oh.” Hux lets his eyes trail from Ren’s face and down over his chest, to his cock. “When you’re--” He hears Ren’s breath catch when he reaches out, and feels Ren’s moan tightening his own skin when he drags his thumb over the wet head of Ren’s cock. “--Like this?”

“Hux,” Ren says, already coming undone, his head thrown back. Hux thinks of the first time someone touched him like this. It had seemed very overdue at seventeen, and Hux had gone off in the other cadet’s hand more for the idea that it was finally happening than because of his classmate’s clumsy touches. 

“Did you really not fantasize about this, at least?” Hux asks, lowering his mouth toward Ren’s cock. 

“It seemed, I-- I don’t know--” 

“Spit it out,” Hux says, aware that his hot breath must feel nice against Ren’s cock, though not nice enough to offer any satisfaction. He’s never really teased any of his partners like this before. Ren probably deserves more careful handling, but Hux can’t resist. 

“I thought maybe it was something only holonet porn stars do,” Ren says. 

Hux snorts. He gives Ren one tiny lick, and lets him watch the trail of pre-come that stretches from the tip of his cock to Hux’s lips as he pulls away. Ren is breathing shallowly. His cock is so hard it’s almost purple, very full. 

“Boys at my Academy did it,” Hux says. “Not to me, however,” he adds. He’s still bitter about that, a little. 

There’s a kind of soft whine building at the back of Ren’s throat. Pre-come beads at the tip of his cock, one fat drop spilling down the shaft. Hux licks his lips. He can’t wait any longer either. 

“Don’t come on my face,” Hux says, and then he puts his mouth around the head of Ren’s cock.

Hux has sucked two cocks in his life, and neither strained against his lips like Ren’s does, stretching his mouth wide. It’s fantastic; he allows his eyes to drift shut in pleasure as the burn at the corners of his lips makes his own cock dribble onto the sheets. Ren is panting audibly, his thighs shaking under Hux’s hands when Hux holds them down as best he can. Hux can’t even get halfway down Ren’s cock, but it doesn’t matter. Ren is about to come, already; he might have been close even when they were kissing.

“Hux!” Ren cries, broken and panicked. Hux pulls off to look up at him, concerned. Ren promptly comes all over Hux’s face. “Sorry!” Ren gasps out, still unloading, still hitting Hux right in the cheek. “Sorry, shit, fuck, I’m sorry--!” 

“It’s fine,” Hux says, though Ren’s come is plentiful, quickly cold, and there’s some in Hux’s eyelashes. He’s so mesmerized by the sight of Ren’s cock as it continues to spurt that the unpleasant reality of come on his face feels like a distant thing in comparison to this glorious, ongoing orgasm that is making Ren writhe as he continues to pant out as many syllables of the word ‘sorry’ as he can manage before his next gulping, astonished breath. Hux watches until Ren has completely emptied himself, then wipes his face on the sheets. 

“Sorry,” Ren says again. He’s breathless, reaching for Hux with both hands. Hux takes Ren’s right hand and kisses his bulky knuckles.

“Where’s the water or whatever that you used to clean me?” Hux asks, still feeling overly sticky. Ren points to a basin in the corner and Hux goes to it, squatting down to use a damp rag to wipe his face clean. He turns back for the bed, startled when he sees Ren has exited it. Ren is on his knees on the stone floor, looking as if he expects to be punished. 

“Let me,” Ren says when Hux only peers at him with confusion. “Let me do you now, okay?”

“Okay,” Hux says, slowly. “Do me in what sense?”

“Your cock, uh. In my mouth. Please.” 

Hux nearly comes just from hearing that from someone-- from Ren --on his knees and trembling as if he thinks he’s unworthy of what he’s asking for. 

“You want to sit like that while you do it?” Hux says, catching on as he walks closer. He wishes he’d come once already; he wants this to last forever and knows that it won’t. “On your knees, with me standing?”

“Yes.” 

“You’re sure you won’t be more comfortable kneeling on the bed?”

“I don’t want to be comfortable. I want it like this.” 

Hux walks closer. Ren is breathing heavily, through his nose, peering up at Hux with pleading eyes. His hands are clasped behind his back, his cock heavy and spent-- beautiful like this, too.

“Is this how it went in your holonet films?” Hux asks, stroking Ren’s face. “One man on his knees, on a hard floor?”

“Yes,” Ren says, more quietly. 

“And do you like the way it feels, so far?”

Ren answers by whimpering and leaning forward to press his face to Hux’s hip. He nuzzles at the soft skin on Hux’s belly like he’s waited his whole life for this. Hux supposes he has, in a sense. He drags his fingers through Ren’s hair and pretends not to be overcome with glee at getting to have this, already close to going off on Ren’s face. 

“Go on,” Hux says, letting his fingers tangle in Ren’s fragrant hair. “You can have a taste.”

Ren does just that, licking the tip. He suckles hungrily at the head after that, swallowing pre-come. Hux groans and pushes his hands into Ren’s hair. He glances around the room, trying to note the details so he won’t come as soon as the heat of Ren’s mouth slides down around him-- most of him, anyway, because Ren is an amateur and probably won’t be gagging on his cock in its entirety. It occurs to Hux, as his eyelids grow heavier and he strokes Ren’s hair, that an incredibly powerful person is on his knees for him, here in this room that, while sparsely furnished, is grand in scale and a bit castle-like, with all the stone and so forth. A room befitting an Emperor, almost, if he squints. An ally befitting one, certainly, Hux thinks, when he looks down at Ren.

“Good,” Hux praises, breathless and struggling not to twitch his hips. “That’s good, yeah. Take it deeper,” he coaxes, pressing his hips forward, just a bit. Ren obeys, his mouth and chin wet, eyes closed, and he sighs as if this is the most luxurious activity that he’s allowed himself in months. Years, maybe. It’s the sigh that does it. Hux whines, stares down at the stretch of Ren’s fat lips around him, and comes. 

“Sorry,” Hux says, his head thrown back and one hand tight in Ren’s hair. He doesn’t really mean it-- Ren swallowed, anyway. Maybe the Force helped him anticipate Hux’s orgasm, but probably not, because apparently erections interfere with the Force, and Ren is very hard when he pulls off of Hux and sits back, spreading his legs as if to _show_ Hux this, as if for his _approval_ , and Hux’s spent cock twitches with exactly that. 

“Doing that for me made you hard?” Hux asks, rubbing his thumb over Ren’s lips. Ren nods slowly, looking mesmerized. 

“I loved it,” Ren says. This sounds like a bigger confession, maybe just because Ren’s voice is so thick, maybe just from swallowing come for the first time ever. Hux yanks him up and kisses him, backing him toward the bed. 

“It was magnificent,” Hux says, and Ren’s eyes widen like Hux is speaking an alien language. When was the last time Snoke said anything remotely praise-like to his apprentice? Possibly it’s never happened. Hux wonders if Ren’s parents loved him, and decides now is not the time to ask. 

It’s very dark outside. The planet’s moon must have set, or maybe it’s become obscured by heavy clouds. Hux doesn’t go to the window to investigate. He kisses Ren, both of them stretched out in the bed again, and he strokes Ren’s face, his hair. Ren’s big cock is wedged between Hux’s thighs, and Ren is making the best, sweetest little noises every time Hux gives it the slightest bit of pressure. Hux is wondering how much longer he can make himself wait before having Ren inside him, and he’s thinking: not very long. 

“Do you know what the most erotic experience of my life prior to tonight was?” Hux asks. 

“The speeder ride?” Ren says, hopefully. 

“Well-- No, Ren, seeing as that was the day of my father’s funeral, I wasn’t feeling particularly aroused.” 

“Oh. Right, sorry.” 

“That was more-- Comforting. Anyway, no, I was referring to something that happened while I was at the Academy. My senior year. We got to do a sniper training exercise at the end of our advanced combat theory course, which already had me half-hard, because that was what I wanted to do.” 

“So how come you’re not a sniper?” Ren asks, a bit testily, maybe just because Hux is recalling fond erotic memories and Ren has none of those, or wishes Hux’s were all about him. 

“I’m not a sniper because my father didn’t want me sneaking around shooting people,” Hux says. “He said it was beneath me.”

“Huh,” Ren says. He seems to consider making some other comment, then withholds it. 

“Cadets were partnered up in pairs of two for this exercise,” Hux says. “With simu-rifles, and our assigned targets had vests that would pick up the shot and tell our instructor if it was a proper kill shot or a miss. It was a pass-fail assignment. My favorite kind, and I got paired up with a very popular cadet. Everybody wanted to fuck him, me included.” 

“Hmm.” Ren looks increasingly displeased about this story, but Hux is going somewhere with it that he hopes Ren will enjoy. He gives Ren’s cock a squeeze with his thighs, to placate him. Ren whimpers and curls in closer. Hux kisses the bridge of Ren’s nose and rejects the impulse to gush something like, _I can’t believe I finally get to do this, I can’t believe it’s with you, I want to stay here in this fucking bed with you forever_.

“Anyway,” Hux says instead, “We had a bead on our man, but we had to wait a long time for him to move from between these trees he was using as cover. My partner-- Derric, that was his name-- He couldn’t lower the rifle or he’d risk losing the shot. So we’re both lying on our bellies behind some shallow cover, and Derric has both hands on the weapon, and I’m hoping that his arms will get too tired so that I’ll be able to take the gun and make the shot myself. And of course he’s stubborn as fuck, and he had really big arms. Though not as big as yours,” Hux says, giving Ren’s dick another squeeze with his thighs. 

“Did you shoot the guy and then jerk each other off?” Ren asks. He sounds angry, despite the dick squeeze and the arm comment. 

“No,” Hux says. “We actually missed that target, and later I shot a different one that saved our grade, but anyway, the point is, Derric complained at one point that his ass itched, and he asked me to scratch it for him, as his partner. He was doing it to make fun of me, sort of, but it was good-natured, I think, and I wanted to call his bluff, so I stuck my hand down the back of his pants and dug my finger into his ass crack.” 

“Why are you telling me this?” Ren asks. He’s making a disgusted face, but he’s also fucking Hux’s thighs a little now, subtly. 

“Because he _moaned_ , and said ‘oh fuck yeah, right there,’ and I almost came in my pants.” 

“So what?” 

“So I’d like to put my fingers in your ass. You may be skeptical, but I think you would enjoy it.” 

“I’m not skeptical! You could have just asked. Fuck, what a stupid story.” 

Hux unclamps his thighs from Ren’s dick and tackles him, hoping to instigate the kind of pre-sex bedroom sparring he used to daydream about during those Academy days. Ren pins him easily, not looking very amused until he sees the expression on Hux’s face. Ren smiles a little and presses his cock down against Hux’s, dragging them together with a teasing roll of his hips that quickly dissolves into erratic humping. 

“Do you have anything to use for lube?” Hux asks, humping up against Ren just as erratically. 

“I came into your room in a breechcloth,” Ren says. “You think I didn’t account for lube?”

“I don’t know what you bloody accounted for, no one’s ever come on to me in a _breechcloth_ before.” 

Ren smirks. Hux laughs against his mouth when he leans in for a kiss. Hux is giddy, twitching with a kind of happiness that’s both electric and sedating, and the idea that he’ll have to leave this bed when the sun comes up is a far away thought, but not quite far away enough. Never mind, he thinks, pulling Ren flush against him and wrapping his legs around Ren’s back for better humping traction. The plan is to rule the galaxy together, it seems. If they have to be apart for some time until that happens, Hux can wait. He’s waited twenty-four years to feel like this, and the crushing length of time spent not having it is part of why it’s so good now: finally, here is a person who wishes to belong to him, and he’s someone Hux wouldn’t mind belonging to in turn.

“Would you fuck me?” Hux asks when he’s too close to coming to care what he’s saying. “Please?” he says, peering up at Ren, who boggles at him for half a second, pinches his eyes shut as if he’s in pain and then groans powerfully as he comes all over Hux’s dick and belly. Hux follows almost immediately, opening his mouth on Ren’s shoulder and biting down when the sharpest waves of his orgasm rake through him.

“What about your fingers?” Ren asks, his breath muggy against Hux’s ear as he lies atop him, gloriously heavy. 

“We’ll do that, too,” Hux says. He rolls his cheek against Ren’s and kisses him. “Sorry I bit you.” 

“You can bite me, I don’t care, you can do anything.” 

Ren fetches the lube he presumably placed in the room while Hux was still asleep. It’s in a side cabinet near the water basin, and Hux isn’t sure why he’s disappointed when he sees it’s standard water-based stuff in a hygienically sealed tube. He was expecting some kind of mystical lube, perhaps homemade, in an old-fashioned glass bottle with a cork stopper. 

“Lie on your back,” Hux says, taking the lube from him. Ren isn’t hard at the moment, so Hux is cautious about his thoughts, not wanting Ren to intercept them. He’s not even confident that he can parse his own thoughts as he sits back and watches Ren spread his legs for him. Unless dryly scratching at Derric Ulmer’s crack during their sniper training session counts, Hux has never actually done this to someone before. He’s had it done to him, but only with a few strokes for maximum efficiency, immediately prior to taking a cock. He wants this to be good for Ren. 

Hux fits himself to Ren’s side and kisses him before reaching down between his legs. Ren’s balls are heavy and a bit sweaty, and they feel distractingly nice resting against Hux’s hand. 

“You’re tight,” Hux says, whispering this against Ren’s mouth as he rubs his finger around somewhat cluelessly. He thought this would be more intuitive. Ren is staring up at him with enraptured wonder, clenching against the pad of his finger. 

“That feels really fucking good,” Ren says, also whispering. 

“You sound surprised. You didn’t believe me when I told you it would?”

“No, I believed you. It’s still surprising, though.” 

Hux goes very slow, not sure if he’s teasing or just feeling protective now. Ren becomes progressively louder and more filthy-mouthed, and Hux kisses him after every astonished curse. Ren still feels impossibly tight around just one finger, and he sobs when Hux tries to work a second one in, then curses Hux for withdrawing it. 

“I can take it,” Ren says, narrowing his eyes at Hux. “Don’t stop.” 

“You’re crying,” Hux says. 

“I am not!” 

But then he sobs again and lets Hux lick the tears off his cheeks. 

“It’s not from pain,” Ren says, glowering. “Sometimes this just happens. It’s because I’m extremely powerful. Because of the Force. I feel things-- A lot.” 

“And what are you feeling now?” Hux asks uneasily, his finger going still. 

“Connected to you,” Ren says. He’s still frowning, blinking out more tears. 

“Oh, am I signing the mystical contract you mentioned, by probing your ass?” 

Hux hopes this comment will lighten the mood. Ren’s tears are making him nervous, and he is sincerely worried about his own sense that there is no going back from this. Ren squeezes hard around his finger. 

“More,” he says. “Now.” 

“Don’t you dare presume to give me orders,” Hux says, but he resumes carefully working a second finger in. Ren wails and nods, grinding himself down onto Hux’s hand. Hux sucks on Ren’s nipple, crooks his fingers, and Ren comes all over himself. 

“Shhh,” Hux says, still fucking Ren with two fingers. He feels a bit like complaining that Ren has gone off again, already, but he’s also proud of himself and beginning to wonder how many times he can make Ren come tonight. Ren’s gaze is feral and trusting at the same time, and he’s relaxed in the aftermath of his orgasm, Hux’s fingers beginning to slide easily in and out. 

“Yes,” Ren says, when Hux opens his mouth. 

“Yes? What? You’re reading my mind?”

“I didn’t mean to. But you were thinking about putting your dick in me. And I want you to, yes, please, Hux, I want it--” 

“Don’t get all worked up,” Hux says, because Ren sounds like he’s close to hyperventilating. Hux’s fingers are still moving inside him. “There’s no need to beg. Of course I’m going to fuck you. Do you think I haven’t been lying here playing with your hot, tight little hole and thinking about how good it will feel around my cock?” 

“Hux,” Ren says, groaning. 

“Just a bit longer,” Hux says, dragging his fingers out slowly. “You’re nearly ready for me, aren’t you?” He turns his fingers so that his knuckles graze Ren’s prostate on the way back in. Ren jerks and cries out, his spent cock twitching against his belly. “What happens when a Force user gets fucked?” Hux asks, his lips pressed to Ren’s ear. “You’re so sensitive.” He licks up a stray tear. “Don’t want to hurt you.” 

He’s attempting to be seductive with this talk, but that’s true. Ren sniffles and presses his face to Hux’s, trembling all over. 

“You won’t,” Ren says, a bit hoarsely. “You won’t hurt me.” 

“How do you know?” 

“Because I _dream_ about you, and you never--”

Ren breaks off there and blinks at Hux, his eyes still wet. He looks stunned, like he’s lost track of where he is. Hux is taken off guard, too. 

“Dream about me how?” Hux asks, sliding his fingers out. 

“I’ve told you. I’ve had visions.” Ren sets his jaw, his eyes hardening. 

“Of me fucking you?” 

Ren takes hold of Hux’s necklace and tugs him forward, until their faces are very close. Ren is breathing hard, and the look in his eyes reminds Hux how big and strong Ren actually is, how much damage he could do if he wanted to. 

“If you’d prefer,” Ren says, “I can turn you onto your stomach and fuck you until you understand.” 

“Until I understand what?” 

“That I belong inside you. That emptiness that you’ve always felt? That hollow longing? That’s where I fit in. Literally. You’re going to cry, too, Hux. You’re going to sob and beg me to never stop filling you.” 

“You’re a lunatic,” Hux says, fondly. He’s ready for that, almost, though he doubts very much that he’ll cry. He pries his necklace carefully from Ren’s fingers and pushes Ren’s shoulders down to the bed, not sure if Ren will allow it. He does, but he still has that hothead look in his eyes, and Hux feels it like a kind of static energy across the back of his neck: Ren’s power, his need to demonstrate that he’s still in control. Hux only has to swipe his wet fingers over Ren’s puffy, overstimulated hole to make this certainty falter, Ren’s eyes going hazy again. “There you go,” Hux says when Ren’s head drops back to the pillow. “Calm down. There’s a good boy,” he says, rubbing Ren’s come-smeared stomach with his other hand as he slides his fingers back into him. 

“Unh-- shut up,” Ren says, his shoulders going boneless. “Enough fingers,” he says, even as he fucks himself down onto them. “I want more.” 

“Greedy,” Hux says. He moves down to kiss the inside of Ren’s thigh, then drags his teeth over the very pale skin there. Ren sighs. He’s getting hard again, already. Hux is not going to last very long inside him. He’s still so tight. But later, maybe, again-- Though really, Hux would prefer to be the one who gets fucked multiple times tonight, staying sloppy and wet for the next round. 

“ _Yes_ ,” Ren says again, maybe just because Hux has pulled his fingers out. Hux flushes as he slicks himself, wondering if Ren overheard him thinking about what it would be like to wake up every hour until dawn and be penetrated again, to stay ready for it and take as much as he can, because who knows when he’ll be able to have this again? Ren smirks, his eyelids heavy when he peers down at Hux. “Can you stop daydreaming about me fucking you long enough to give me my turn?” he asks. 

“Keep making fun and see how far that gets you,” Hux says, though nothing can stop him from having Ren now. He’s feeling Ren’s readied hole, holding his slicked cock, keeping his eyes locked on Ren’s as the amusement drains from them. 

“Please,” Ren says, and he swallows, throat bobbing. “Please, Hux.” 

Hux doesn’t push in as slowly as he’d planned to. He can’t: he’s overcome, and it feels like Ren is drawing him in deeper, as if he has hold of the necklace again, pulling. Ren’s gaze is locked on Hux’s, his hands moving up along Hux’s arms and onto his shoulders as Hux sinks into him, finally bottoming out and collapsing onto Ren’s chest to try to catch his breath. Hux has only been in this position once, while drunk. That felt nothing like this. Ren is velvety hot and clenching around him, his hands soothing over Hux’s back as if he’s the one being pried open. The necklace is pressed between them, digging into Hux’s chest. It still feels cool, even lodged there between their sweaty bodies. 

“Yeah,” Ren says when Hux sucks at his collarbone, drooling. “Yeah, just-- Just like that.”

“Like what?” Hux tries to laugh, but it comes out as a moan when he shifts inside Ren. “I’m just lying here.” 

“That’s okay,” Ren says. He reaches down and pries Hux’s ass cheeks apart. Hux gasps when Ren’s finger circles his hole; he somehow didn’t seem that coming. 

“What,” Hux says, pressing back. They both groan when he slides back into Ren. “What are you-- Doing--”

“You don’t want me to touch you here?” 

“I’m _fucking you_ , Ren,” Hux says. His face is blazing, and he arches back into Ren’s touch again. Again, they both groan when this results in Hux fucking into Ren shallowly. 

“No reason I can’t feel you up while you’re inside me,” Ren says. “I’ve got long arms.” 

“Fucking hell,” Hux says, again trying to laugh. He can’t manage it this time either, and he groans instead, sliding his legs apart around Ren as he gropes for the lube. Ren feels so good, so solid and tight, and Hux is sweltering hot upon him and inside him, moaning in approval when Ren presses at his hole with a lube-slicked finger. 

It’s the strangest sex ever, Hux thinks-- Appropriately, considering who he’s fucking. He melts into it and slobbers all over Ren’s neck, his mouth soaking wet for the feeling of being inside Ren and worked open by Ren’s fingers at the same time. He mutters praise against Ren’s skin, telling him he’s doing so well, not specifying if this praise is for Ren’s ability to take the slow, deep strokes of Hux’s cock or to finger him open like he knows what he’s doing. 

“It feels like there’s two of you,” Hux mumbles deliriously when he’s getting close to coming, imagining a calm Ren behind him on his knees with those clever fingers while the Ren beneath him squeezes greedily around his dick. 

“I could do it with no hands,” Ren says, his fingers going still. “I mean, probably. I haven’t tried it before, obviously.”

“Don’t stick the Force up my ass, please.” 

They both laugh, and Hux sits back, Ren’s hand sliding from him as he does. Hux runs his hands down over Ren’s damp chest, then very lightly over his cock, which makes him shiver. Hux touches Ren’s thighs, his knees, then drags his hands up to Ren's shoulders again.

“Fuck me,” Ren says, clenching around him. Hux groans gives Ren his first sharp thrust. Ren’s mouth falls open. He nods, and arches when Hux snaps his hips again. 

“You look so good like this,” Hux says, his voice cracking as he barely stops himself from saying _You’re beautiful_ , because who even says that, and it’s hardly the right word. He comes, pitching forward into Ren’s arms, and makes a few noises that are even more humiliating than the poetic language he avoided.

Hux is still shaky from his orgasm when he pulls out, slaps lube onto Ren’s cock and sinks onto him, too fast. His scream starts when he’s halfway down and chokes off into a pathetic whimper as he bottoms out. 

“Hey, hey,” Ren says, sitting up. Hux is squatting over his lap, tremors of regret and excitement moving through him when realizes, belatedly, just how fucking enormous Ren really is. “Be careful,” Ren murmurs, though it’s too late for that. Hux will be so sore tomorrow. He cries out in something like gratitude for the thought, as if that, at least, is something he’ll be able to keep, and he slumps into Ren’s arms when they wrap around him. 

“Ren--” Hux refuses to cry, but his voice isn’t working properly. He clings to Ren’s shoulders and whines when he tries to move, so completely full that he’s not sure it’s possible. Ren’s hands slide over his back, one pushing up along Hux’s neck and into his sweat-damp hair. 

“You’re okay,” Ren says, whispering. He nips at Hux’s ear. “You’re all right, I’ve got you.” 

“No shit,” Hux says, because he’s pinned like an insect on Ren’s dick-- Only, no, it doesn’t feel that way at all, though Ren is so long and thick that Hux is still afraid to move. He lets his head loll onto Ren’s shoulder, and when he takes a breath it feels like Ren is taking is one, too, not at the same time but along with him, as if they’ve fused. Hux has his legs wrapped around Ren, and he feels suddenly quite small, like one of Ren’s hands could cover his entire back. 

“You feel so good,” Ren says. His voice is wobbling a little, and Hux isn’t sure how, but he understands-- Ren isn’t just talking about the tight heat of Hux’s body. He’s hearing Hux’s thoughts-- or non-thoughts, half-formed sensations that seem to flow between them like a power that builds and builds, and this only their first time. Hux holds on so tight. By the time he feels a sob building in his chest he doesn’t care if Ren hears it, feels it, because he understands now. These aren't the kind of tears he's become too good at instructing himself not to shed. They're not shameful or even weak. They're representative of some kind of enormous, nearly bursting strength, something too big to hold inside. Ren moans and holds Hux closer when Hux cries against his neck with a kind of profound, bone-shaking relief. The first time he’s cried since he was four years old.

“Fuck,” Hux says, still wanting to get a little angry about it. He tugs Ren’s hair over his face and wipes his cheeks dry with it, sniffling. 

“Would it make you feel better if I fucked you hard?” Ren asks, his thumb moving on Hux’s side. 

Hux snorts. “In one sense, yes,” he says. “In another, ah. I might break in half.” 

Ren tips Hux onto his back, gently. He fucks him gently, too, and for a long time, finally able to last after his three previous hasty orgasms. Hux stares up at him with open adoration not befitting an Emperor, whimpering under his breath and unable to stop touching Ren’s hair. It’s only grown more fragrant, infused with sex sweat that amplifies the sweet poison of the flowering vine he rubbed into it. Hux is sure now that it was some kind of Force spell, that vine-rubbing trick, but he doesn’t care. Ren is inside him, all around him, and Hux has dreamed about him, too. _You won’t hurt me_ , he thinks, staring up at Ren, who wipes at the corners of Hux’s eyes when they leak. _Not you, not ever_.

Only after Ren has come inside him and pulled out, leaving him gaping and sore, does Hux remember that by all rational accounting he’s lost his mind. Everyone he left with for the Lasan mission is dead, and he’s having marathon sex with a wizard in another wizard’s castle. He’s been wearing their magic crystal around his neck for four years, and it has begun building a weapon in his mind, using his practical intelligence as a springboard for its own far more sinister machinations. He accepts a damp cloth from the basin from Ren, and when he just stares at it, reeling too wildly to know what to do with it, Ren takes it back and cleans Hux up himself. 

“What’s the name of this planet?” Hux asks when Ren stretches out beside him, not touching him yet. 

“Uh.” Ren rubs his hand over his eyes, briefly looking too young to have just delighted and devastated Hux’s body so thoroughly. “Warl, I think.” 

“ _Warl_? What kind of name is that? That’s like the sound of someone being sick, not a name for a planet. I’ve never heard of it.” 

Hux can feel Ren staring at him. He refuses to look back, but only for a few seconds. 

“You don’t have to feel bad about crying,” Ren says, a little sharply.

“I don’t.” 

“Okay. Why are you panicking?”

“I’m not. But if I was-- Could you blame me? What am I supposed to do with all of this, Ren?”

“All of what?” 

Hux moans and shakes his head. He draws Ren into his arms, not wanting him to feel rejected. This isn’t Ren’s fault, but Hux can’t shake the feeling that something is ruined, like he’s just rolled over a cliff while not paying attention. He might not hit the jagged rocks below for years, but they’re coming. He can’t erase what’s already waiting for him, solid and sharp.

“You still don’t trust me,” Ren says.

“It’s not you.” Hux hooks his leg around Ren’s side, clinging, though his instincts are telling him to run. He has nowhere to go, until the shuttle Snoke cleared to land arrives for him in the morning. 

_It’s Snoke you don’t trust._

That’s Ren’s voice in his head, which should be alarming. Instead, it’s comforting. Hux peers up at him. He needs to change the subject fast, in case Snoke is listening in.

“Where do you come from?” Hux asks. “Who were your parents?”

Ren stiffens. “Why?” he asks. 

“Because--What, it’s strange that I want to know something about you, after what we just did? You knew my father.” 

“Not really.”

“You knew enough. Tell me, please.” 

Ren studies Hux’s eyes. He reaches down and takes the crystal in his palm, exhales. 

“My parents were normal people,” he says. “They didn’t know what to do with me. So I left.” 

“Left-- For Snoke?”

“Yes.”

Hux wants to ask if Ren regrets it. Ren’s eyes snap up to his, wide with worry. 

_Don’t_ , Ren says, in Hux’s mind. _Please_.

“My mother was a chef,” Hux says, blurting this when he feels a sharpening dread stretching between them, something he fears might be Snoke’s piqued attention. “My father fell in love with her when he was a boy, when she was a girl who worked in the kitchen at his parents’ estate. He wasn’t allowed to marry her, but he always made sure she had a job nearby. People in his parents’ circles mocked him for her, and for me. He took her with him when he had to live in exile, and left me with my grandparents. They hated her, and hated me. She didn’t come back.”

Hux makes himself stop talking. Ren’s eyes are soft with sympathy. Hux wants to resent it; he’s not even sure his mother is dead. All Brendol ever said was ‘we’ve lost her.’ 

“My mother was a Princess of Alderaan,” Ren says. 

They talk for most of the night, their heads pressed together and their hands roaming with aimless, tender reverence. Ren’s secrets make Hux gasp like a child, twice. Ren cries, but only once. Hux kisses him and rides him again, more recklessly this time, though he knows he’s damning himself to an ache in his ass that will make sitting uncomfortable. He doesn’t care; he doesn’t care about anything when Ren is inside him. 

At some point, half-awake, Hux watches Ren take his necklace into his mouth. Ren sucks on the crystal, and Hux can feel it all the way down his spine, as if Ren has licked Hux’s most sensitive body part wholly into his mouth, rolling it on his tongue and making it so wet. Hux groans and knocks his forehead against Ren’s, shudders. It feels a bit like an orgasm that goes on and on, and Hux waits to start weeping, but then he just falls asleep.

He wakes up alone and finds a regulation First Order uniform folded at the end of the bed, perfectly clean and undeniably tailored to his measurements. 

After he’s dressed, Hux sits on the end of the bed and waits. It’s already bright outside. His whole body aches, though not the way he expected it to. The crystal is cool against his skin, under his uniform shirt. 

He hears footsteps in the hall, and his optimism doesn’t last long. When the door creaks open, he knows Ren isn’t behind it. 

“Ah, Major Hux,” Snoke says. His hood is down, revealing every gnarled scar. Hux has never seen him without it before. “Good. You’re awake.”

This observation strikes Hux like a reprimand. He’s awakened from a fantasy, and he never should have let himself believe it could be real. He stands, keeping his posture rigid and his face expressionless. 

“Kylo Ren was with you last night,” Snoke says. 

“Yes,” Hux says. He wants to ask where Ren is now, but he knows better. His heart is slamming. His skin feels dry and hot, like something in danger of catching flame. 

“Did you enjoy him?” Snoke asks. 

Hux stares at Snoke. His hands flinch at his sides, but he’s not stupid enough to dare curling them into fists. He can feel Snoke filling the room as if he’s arrived with an army, his immense, rank power cluttering the air. 

“Answer me, Major. Did you enjoy your time with Kylo Ren?” 

“Yes,” Hux says, unable to stop his lip from flinching upward in disgust. 

Snoke's black eyes seem to glitter, as if he enjoys this mild flick of defiance. 

“Good,” Snoke says. “He’s a very powerful boy, but easy to manipulate. As my ally, assuming you turn in a satisfactory performance, you shall have access to him as I see fit. A shuttle from your ship is on its way to retrieve you, meanwhile. I have taken command of the First Order, in the wake of the Lasan disaster. General Boff was incompetent, and his lack of foresight nearly got you killed along with the rest of the officers deployed to Lasan. Under my command, you will be far more secure, and handsomely rewarded for your successful cooperation.” 

Snoke allows that to sink in, his twisted mouth inching into something like a smile.

“Yes,” Hux says, his stomach or his heart plummeting-- They feel tied together, both completely fucked. “Sir.” 

“Supreme Leader, please.” 

“Yes, Supreme Leader.”

“Good,” Snoke says. “I had a feeling you would be agreeable.” 

Hux meets the shuttle from his ship minutes or hours later. He can’t tell. He feels cut off from time, and all else. He stares out the shuttle’s viewport at the landscape of Warl as the small craft blasts away. Under his shirt, the crystal throbs against his skin, pulsing like a warning signal. Hux can’t know if this pulse represents reassurance from Ren or cold laughter from Snoke. He’ll never know, now, how to untangle the two. 

 

 

**


	4. Chapter 4

As he directs his shuttle’s visibly frightened pilot through a deteriorating mess of stone and flame that represents what remains of his life’s work, Hux’s panic allows entry to a thought that doesn’t belong here and yet finds its way through to coherence: the memory of his favorite captain, likely dead now, asking him why he’s never married. 

Hux had given Phasma a long look in response, studying her to determine if she was suggesting something about him and Kylo Ren rather than sincerely wondering. But she had been assigned to the _Finalizer_ well after the general population might have thought Hux and Ren were anything but bitter rivals, and Phasma’s expression was earnest, even kind, as if it had surprised her to gradually discern that the General was a lonely, unattached man. 

They had been in the officers’ wardroom, at the bar. That evening seems a lifetime ago already, part of some other world that is all but gone as the shuttle’s bay door opens over the shaking ground below. 

“Wait for me,” Hux says to the pilot. He only took one man, knowing they both might die, and that Ren might already-- But, no. Hux would have felt that, somehow, though he doesn’t wear a piece of crystallized quintessence around his neck anymore. It is among his possessions in his quarters on Starkiller, however. So it’s gone now, too, or will be in a matter of minutes. 

The tracker in Hux’s hand indicates that Ren is nearby. Hux cautions himself against premature relief, as this may be the moment when Ren has finally decided to separate himself from the belt that contains the tracker’s corresponding signal. What Hux had almost been drunk enough to tell Phasma, that night at the bar in a world that has ended, is that the closest he’s gotten to an actual promise of matrimony is Kylo Ren’s refusal to either acknowledge or remove the device that Hux placed in his belt shortly after Ren returned from a long period of training with his Knights. It was an unspoken agreement that Hux put far too much stock in when things had otherwise dwindled to almost nothing between them: whatever Ren said from behind that mask, he still wore Hux’s tracker on his belt. He still wanted some kind of connection. 

He finds Ren prone and bloody in the snow, not far from a growing chasm that seems to roar as it splits along the earth like a monster’s devouring jaw. Based on the blood trailed through the snow, Ren attempted to drag himself farther from the edge, then gave up. He now lies in a heap, breathing heavily. The helmet is gone. 

“Get up,” Hux says, kneeling beside him. “I’ve got a shuttle.”

It’s absurd to imagine he’ll have to assist, considering the disparity of physical power between them, but Ren appears to have lost a lot of blood. Ren’s hair is slashed over his face like an impromptu mask, streaked with blood and heavy with sweat, only one eye visible. Without moving, he shifts his gaze to lock on Hux’s. 

“You came.” Ren’s voice is gravel, defeat, buried rage. 

“He ordered me to.” 

This may be the most violently cruel thing Hux has ever said to anyone. No matter: he’s arrived here on a wave of his own buried rage, the only thing left in him that’s still mobile. 

“Come on,” Hux says, reaching for Ren but also afraid to touch him. “Now, we’ve got to go.” 

Ren laughs, or maybe it’s more of a disbelieving growl. He may be thinking, like Hux, of that day when he appeared amid swirling chaos to whisk Hux safely into a shuttle. And of what followed.

Getting Ren up takes some effort, and he’s uncomfortably warm against Hux’s side, sticky and exhaling in ragged huffs that pain Hux, too. Once he’s on his feet, Ren moves more easily than Hux expected, still leaning against Hux until they’re running, the chasm behind them surging forward to consume everything. Ren throws Hux onto the shuttle with one arm before crawling in behind him. 

Hux scrambles up from the floor, screaming at the pilot to take off, though he wasn’t waiting for an order and the shuttle is already in motion, dodging massive trees as they topple and splinter apart. Hux falls against the back of the pilot’s seat and watches through the viewport, teeth grit, until they’re clear of what’s left of Starkiller. Which is, rapidly, right before his eyes: nothing. 

His gut clenches, and he turns away. He expects to find Ren standing, glowering, as he was at least powerful enough to sling Hux into the shuttle without seeming to struggle. Ren is on the floor, bent over with his head pressed to the ground. The wound on his side is grisly, still bleeding. 

_Bring Kylo Ren to me_. Snoke had meant directly, immediately, and personally. Hux is sure. He’d selected a shuttle with the capability to take them all the way to Snoke’s planet. 

“Set course for the _Finalizer_ ,” Hux says, still looking at Ren. “Tell medbay to prepare a bacta tank for Lord Ren.” 

Ren makes no protest, though he must sense that Hux is disobeying a direct order from his master. Or perhaps physical pain has dulled his ability to feel such things through the Force. Pleasure did so easily enough, once. Hux goes to Ren and kneels beside him, trying to get a better look at the wound while Ren pants and shakes as if he’s fighting to contain a more personal implosion. 

“Let me see,” Hux says, though there’s really nothing to do about the wound without removing Ren’s clothes, and they’ll be aboard the _Finalizer_ soon enough. Hux pulls his command cap from the pocket of his greatcoat and stuffs it against Ren’s side to stop the flow of blood. Ren makes a kind of angry snuffling noise in response, like an injured animal too weak to struggle against some type of care that it meant to retreat from. 

“He sent you to retrieve me?” Ren says-- Doubtfully, and Hux imagines he would feel Ren crawling into his mind to check the veracity of this claim if Ren wasn’t too beaten to manage it. 

“That’s so hard to believe? He sent you for me, once.” 

Ren turns to give Hux a disbelieving snarl, and only then does Hux see the gash on his face, still half-concealed by the hair that’s stuck to it. He sees a reflection of his own shock in Ren’s expression, which briefly softens into something that makes Hux reach for him. 

“Who--” Hux’s hand freezes before making contact with any part of Ren. He shouldn’t touch the cut; it wouldn’t be sanitary. There’s just something very personal and vicious about the way it slices across Ren’s face, and Hux wants to touch not the torn skin but something else-- Ren’s cheek, or his hair. Ren looks away, his hair falling over his face again. 

“Supreme Leader,” Ren says, as if he’s speaking to Snoke in lieu of his messenger. “What other orders did he give?”

“That you’re to complete your training. I’m-- I’ll bring you to him. When you’re well enough.” 

Ren says nothing. Hux’s own _training_ under Snoke’s direction will soon be completed, too, and for Hux that completion will probably mean death. Probably in view of Ren. Probably as Snoke has always intended, when Hux wore out his usefulness or did something that particularly annoyed him. Allowing the destruction of Starkiller likely qualifies, and Hux long ago lost his ability to participate in Snoke’s manipulation of Ren the way he once did so handily. 

“Do you think he’ll make you kill me yourself?” Hux asks, speaking softly enough to keep the pilot from hearing. 

Ren looks at him then, but only indirectly, from the corner of his eye. It’s not an appropriate question for this occasion or ever, really, but Hux hopes that Ren heard the sympathy in his voice. Obeying that particular command would mean the last of Ren had been subsumed by his master’s will, or maybe Hux is only flattering himself. 

“You won’t die,” Ren says. 

“I’m to take your word for it, in my position?” 

“Take whatever you want, or don’t. You’ll outlive me. I’ve always sensed it.” 

Hux scoffs and stands, unable to take that claim seriously right now. He walks toward the pilot, meets his eyes in the reflection on the viewport and gives him an approving nod. 

“You did well,” Hux says, wondering if this is his final chance to praise his staff. “And I’d appreciate your discretion about this mission, going forward.” 

“Of course, sir. And thank you, sir.” 

Hux isn’t sure why it matters anymore, but he feels protective of Ren. How many crew members will see Ren in this state, on the trip from the shuttle to medbay? Where is his helmet? Taken as trophy by the one who marked his face? Sliced off, perhaps? 

“I dropped it,” Ren says, and Hux turns to frown at him. 

“You’d better rehearse a better explanation for Supreme Leader,” Hux says, rage welling up again. “Because that one sounds rather pathetic to me.” 

Ren remains silent for the rest of the trip to the _Finalizer_ , aside from his heavy breathing, which scrapes against Hux’s consciousness like a call to action that he’s not answering. If Ren is still sorting through Hux’s thoughts, Hux can’t feel it. He’s surprised that Ren even cared to respond to his wondering about the helmet. Perhaps Hux shouldn’t have been cold to him in response. 

As if it matters now, with everything coming to an end. 

Aboard the ship, Hux resumes command, though he feels as if he’s already been demoted to a walking dead man in Snoke’s view. Ren is whisked off to medbay by droids. Hux tries not to think of him overmuch, and tries to consider his brisk walk to medbay, as soon as he’s off shift, as something incidental rather than an urgent, pulse-pounding need. 

Ren is in the back, in the biggest tank they have. No one is with him: who would be? A doctor oversaw his treatment, presumably, but only droids attend to him now, and he’s unconscious anyway, floating. The droids must have hosed him down before installing him in the tank. His hair wafts around his face and in front of his eyes, free of blood. The cut on his face is raw but shallow, already healing. There will certainly be a scar, rather thick down toward his jaw. Hux stands close, his nose almost up against the glass, and observes the process of Ren’s wounds being slowly knit back together in their bacta bath. Bubbles form over ragged skin, everything greenish under the tank’s soft light. 

_This is the person who has shaped my entire life_ , Hux thinks, looking up into Ren’s passive face, much of it obscured by a breathing mask. But that life-shaping person was really Snoke. If he can even be called a person. Hux had always just wanted it to be Ren, which was precisely what enabled Snoke to become the one who actually guided Hux’s every decision. 

Hux hears that hateful voice in his head when he puts his hand against the bacta tank. _Did you enjoy him?_ He imagines Snoke asking him that again, just before delivering the death blow. He would intend to mock Hux with the question, again. 

_Yes_ , Hux would say, with sneering defiance this time, though this response would possibly make his death more painful or prolonged. And it’s not even entirely true. Did he enjoy Kylo Ren? 

He sits in a chair across from Ren’s tank, exhausted but unwilling to leave him alone, and makes an inventory of times they enjoyed each other. That first night they spent together, of course, though over the years they both also came to resent it, because they had been such fools to trust the security they felt then. After that, Snoke kept Ren away for a long time, training or on missions, and Hux was determined to be closed off when he saw Ren again, not willing to play Snoke’s sick game, but of course he had been beside himself when they reunited, after an initial attempt at stoicism. Ren hadn’t seemed complicit then; he’d appeared so hurt, as soon as he’d cornered Hux alone and pulled off that helmet. It had been almost a year, Ren said. He could feel that Hux still wore the necklace Ren gave him under his uniform. He could sense that Hux wanted him, that his heart was pounding. Why was he pretending otherwise? 

_Why, Hux? What’s wrong? What happened?_

Ren’s face when he asked those questions. His expression had a strange sweetness that made him look like overgrown boy, though he was actually a man who had just returned from butchering their enemies. Hux can still see it, very clearly, even now, as he stares helplessly up at the older, scarred version of that same face. 

Hux couldn’t vocalize it that day or at any point afterward. Snoke was using Ren to control Hux and vice versa, Snoke had clearly orchestrated the attack on Lasan and the sordid business that followed, Snoke would pitch them both into the garbage when he’d wrung everything useful from them. Brendol had underestimated Snoke. Everyone had, even Ren. Especially Ren, Hux was beginning to fear. Ren’s affection for Hux was only part of his master’s plan to ensnare the First Order into his arsenal for practical purposes. Hux had even begun to wonder if Snoke had killed Brendol somehow. He was already aware that he would only be alive for as long as he was useful to the Supreme Leader and his occasionally sweet-faced attack dog. 

But none of this seemed to matter as much as it should have when Hux was at last staring into Ren’s face again, so instead of the chilly dismissal he’d rehearsed he said, with tremendous guilt and shame but with more conviction than he’d said anything for the past year: 

“Come to my room tonight.” 

Having Ren crowded around him in his narrow bed after the long months of nothing allowed Hux to ignore his reservations easily enough, just as Snoke had surely known it would. Only after they’d fucked twice did Hux notice all the new scars. Ren claimed not to remember their origins specifically. 

“What is he training you to accomplish?” Hux asked when they were whispering together in the dark, Hux tracing careful fingertips over the thickest scars, touching them as if they might reopen under too much pressure. Just voicing this question had made Hux feel as if Snoke was in the room, too, smiling in approval from some corner. 

“He’s helping me harness the full extent of my power,” Ren explained. He was calm that night, stroking Hux’s hair and kissing him slow, soft, as if they had so much time. “It is a long process,” Ren said. “Lifelong, really.” 

“So you’ll always have Snoke to guide you,” Hux said, unable to keep the distaste from his tone. “Or do you expect to outlive him?”

It was the mildest way Hux could think to ask if Ren might ever defy his master. The lights were very low, ten percent at most. Ren held Hux’s gaze in a way that made Hux brace himself to hear Ren’s voice in his head. 

“I have no expectations about my own life,” Ren said. “That’s what makes me powerful. I surrender to the Force.” 

“And to Snoke,” Hux said, his heart beginning to thud like a warning: _Don’t, don’t_. Hux had heard that word in his head, in Ren’s voice, last time he’d dared these kinds of questions. 

“And to Snoke,” Ren said, sternly, his eyes hard. Then he reached forward, took the quintessence crystal on Hux’s necklace and slipped it into his mouth, held it on his tongue.

It felt like a promise, like their secret. Hux moaned and nodded, renewed arousal flaming from the back of his neck, where the necklace was pulled taut, all the way down his spine and along his legs. Ren smiled around the necklace, winked.

For years, they had a policy of not allowing concerns about the future to spoil their too-brief reunions in the present. It was always so good at first, like getting drunk without worrying about the hangover to come. Ren seemed bigger every time he returned to Hux, stronger and thicker, and there were always new scars. Hux’s willpower felt thinner every time, meanwhile, like a paltry thing he could extract and reclaim later, though he knew he would eventually berate himself for surrendering to the bittersweet joy of having Ren in arms him again and for not thinking enough about what it meant to let himself enjoy the reward of him as Snoke saw fit to dole it out. 

The joy was fleeting, but when Ren’s cock was buried deep in him, Hux couldn’t deny that it was real. He felt so full when Ren was all around him, inside him, not just physically but in a place that even his father’s hard-won love and acceptance had never reached. It was always just as it had been when Ren caught him on those stairs at the Institute: suddenly Hux was suspended outside of space and time as he knew them, and none of the shameful, secret fears that had been his constant companions since he was four years old could touch him. They weren’t gone, but they were separated from Hux along with his pride and his better judgment. Surrendering these things shouldn’t have made Hux feel complete, but it did. Ren did, once. 

What were the best times they had together? That first reunion doesn’t count, at least not for Hux; he was too quickly disappointed in himself for giving in, and Ren was too quickly gone. Those earliest dalliances between missions seemed too calculated, according to Snoke’s design. Hux was afraid to say so to Ren, and not sure if Ren could read this awareness from his thoughts, which put a steadily growing wall between them even when they were locked around each other, clinging. Their encounters didn’t really reach peak bittersweet satisfaction until after their first fight that almost came to blows. 

Hux can’t remember now what had set him off; something work-related, and then the sudden appearance of Ren, loudly making additional demands on Snoke’s behalf. Hux exploded, called Ren Snoke’s pet and accused him of not understanding what it was like to exist in the real world, which was fair and true enough, though Ren didn’t see it that way. He grit his teeth and asked Hux if he wanted to see what the man he considered a pet could really do. 

“Going to choke me with the Force?” Hux asked, because Ren had done that to an enemy soldier in a recent battle; Hux had been hearing about it all over the ship, which at that time was the _Vigilant_. “Lift me off the ground without touching me?”

“No,” Ren said, and instead he pinned Hux to the wall and rendered him motionless from the neck down, stood back and watched his futile struggle against the perfect hold Ren had on him, Hux’s eyes narrowing hatefully even as the sensation of being so completely restrained made him hard in his uniform pants. “You’ve fantasized about this,” Ren said, his eyes trailing down to Hux’s crotch. “Haven’t you?”

“You’re an animal,” Hux said. “He’s making you-- Made you-- You’ve gone _feral_.” 

“Not quite,” Ren said. He walked closer, his hand stretched out toward Hux as if he needed the gesture to keep Hux in place. “I’d respond to a command. Tell me to release you and I will.” 

Hux cut his eyes away, pretending that his reluctance to make that request had more to do with not wanting to follow Ren’s script rather than his increasing enjoyment of the feeling of being held helpless, even for just a moment, after scrambling nonstop for the past two cycles to contain the latest crisis. Ren had barged into a private conference room that Hux had reserved in order to get some work done. They were alone. Hux swallowed as Ren came to stand just in front of him, a breath away from pressing their bodies together. Ren was still wearing the helmet. Hux refused to look at him. 

“Tell me to release you,” Ren said. There was something new in his voice, noticeable even from behind the mask. It was desperate, though Hux was the one locked in a Force hold, pressed to the wall and leaking into his underwear, unwilling to ask Ren to let him go. 

Hux exhaled with audible gratitude when Ren touched him, running his gloved hand from Hux’s chest and down to his belt. Ren stopped there, the rasp of his breath so close to Hux’s cheek that Hux thought he could feel the heat of it even through the mask. 

“Tell me,” Ren said. “What you want.” 

“Don’t--” Hux pinched his eyes shut and swallowed hard. “Don’t let me go.” 

Hux had wanted to ask him to take the mask off, too, but he held that in, already getting in the habit of clinging to whatever shreds of his pride he could keep during his encounters with Ren. He only let his mouth fall open when Ren dragged his hand down, slowly, and cupped it too gently around Hux’s erection. 

“I’ve seen your fantasies about this,” Ren said, fingers twitching. 

“Good to know you’re spying on me all the time,” Hux said, turning to sneer at the mask. “When we’re together.” 

“This is what you _want_ me to be,” Ren said-- Angry, unraveling, Hux could hear it. He was glad; he wanted company in his own unraveling. “Feral, and devoid of free will. I don’t have to dig very deep to sense what you think of me.” 

Hux opened his mouth to respond. Ren squeezed his cock, hard, to cut his protest off. 

“I don’t know what to think,” Hux confessed, wrenching his head to the side again, wanting to tear away from Ren’s unseen, piercing gaze and to fuck his hand at the same time. “You’re not mine to know, are you? You’re his-- Whatever you are, you belong to him.”

“Whereas you’d prefer I belonged to you. Truly a pet. Waiting in your rooms.” 

“No.” 

“No?”

Hux set his jaw to hold in an exclamation like _I miss you, fuck you, of course I want you in my rooms every night_ , or something worse. Ren squeezed him again, now not so hard. Hux closed his eyes and tried to press into Ren’s touch. He was surprised to find that he could move, though just in little twitches. Ren was holding him more than restraining him. Supporting him, rubbing his cock more urgently, smelling faintly of sweat even through all his layers. Hux wanted to lick it off of him. He wanted to be in a bed, wanted Ren to take the mask off. He came in his pants, gasping, still wanting all these things when Ren turned and released him from what remained of the Force hold, barking a reminder about Snoke’s latest order as he left the room. 

Was that when things changed? Hux has tried to pin it to many different moments over the years. His eyelids are heavy now, the green light from Ren’s bacta tank seeming to bleed outward as his vision blurs. He puts his head back against the wall behind his chair and closes his eyes. Just for a moment. 

Ren has only become more indistinct and unknowable to Hux over the years. First the sex got rougher, which Hux didn’t mind and in fact quite enjoyed. Ren once threw Hux onto a conference room table, tore his pants down just enough to gain access to his hole, bent him in half with his knees pressed to his chest and dropped down to lick into him so well that Hux came untouched onto his uniform shirt, panting Ren’s name. Hux had his turn often enough, usually ordering Ren to his knees and fucking his mouth, pulling his hair. Ren never lost his affinity for that particular arrangement. 

It reached a point where they were never not angry with each other. Hux knew that Ren could sense his distrust of Snoke and how it had spread to Ren, too, and Hux hated Ren for not confronting him about it. To Hux, this meant his every suspicion and paranoia about being only a pawn to both of them was true. 

But he had his moments of doubting that Ren could belong to anyone but him, even toward the end. That shore leave on Yinnix, when Ren suddenly appeared, maskless and without his usual conspicuous ensemble, smirking at Hux’s wide-eyed surprise.

“I’m on a mission,” Ren said. “Undercover.” 

“Tell me,” Hux had said, frowning. 

“I can’t. It’s not to do with the Order.” 

“Tell me anyway.” 

Ren wouldn’t say a word about his mission. Hux had wanted to spend the few hours they had together resenting him for that, but he couldn’t. He had a motel room with a middling view of Yinnix’s famous Golden Lake, and he closed its curtains against the twin sunset over the shimmering water, the glare that bounced off the lake’s surface almost blindingly bright at that time of day. He tugged his shirt off and turned from the window to find Ren already naked. 

Hux had put the tracker in Ren’s belt years before, but he hadn’t been in possession of the device when Ren surprised him on the lake shore. He normally only bothered with it when Ren was on the ship and therefore in range, though sometimes, late at night, he did flick it on even though he knew that Ren was very far away, untraceable from Hux’s current location. He always felt like a fool when he turned it off again, the lack of signal confirming yet again that Hux had no claim on Ren’s whereabouts or on any other part of him beyond the fucks sanctioned by Ren’s keeper. By then, the crystal also offered little comfort if Hux reached up under his shirt to grip it. Since he’d begun building the Starkiller, the necklace felt more like a reminder of his forthcoming trial by fire than a speeder ride through the rain long ago.

But that evening on Yinnix, with the fading light blazing around the edges of the room’s curtains: Ren was newly gentle, sad-eyed when Hux caught him staring, and he’d murmured words he hadn’t used in years against Hux’s ear. Like _perfect_ and _mine_ and _missed you, needed this_.

“Do you even have a mission here?” Hux asked when Ren was inside him for the second time, close enough to orgasm to be startled into honesty, maybe. “Or did you just come here to fuck me?” Hux asked when Ren’s eyes snapped open, his thrusts slowing. They were facing each other, Hux’s shoulders against the headboard and his ankles spread wide, Ren’s hands wrapped tightly around them. 

“I’ve done so much for you,” Ren said, going completely still. He was short of breath; something that looked like angry hurt hardened in his eyes. “And you’d taunt me for it if you really thought I’d come here for you.” 

Hux was knocked speechless by that, tumbling away from his own orgasm, which had been steadily approaching before he allowed himself to blurt that stupid question. He wanted to laugh and ask what the hell Ren had done for him lately, or ever, but he couldn’t even make his lips curve into a cruel smile.

“Forget it,” Ren said, pulling out with a grunt-- Too fast, and Hux was too slow to swallow a whine when it stung. He was afraid Ren was going to storm out without finishing and without another word, and was only partially relieved when Ren flipped him onto his hands and knees instead, shoving back in before Hux could decide how to address whatever had just passed between them. 

Ren fucked him roughly then, as usual. Hux enjoyed it, somewhat distantly-- He came in his own hand, his moan muffled against the bedsheets. Ren was silent when he unloaded inside him, but Hux felt it. He was so familiar with that slight thickening when Ren’s release pulsed against his stretched-out rim. Hux loved the sensation, and hated it. More and more often, as the years passed, it meant Ren would leave him soon, without even falling onto Hux’s back to recover a bit and press an open-mouthed kiss to the side of his neck. Things that had once been standard. As Ren slid away, Hux wondered which of them had put an end to those old comforts. Surely it had been Ren. But maybe it had been Hux. 

No, he thought, slumping against the sheets as Ren left the bed. Snoke was the one who’d yanked everything that should have been theirs alone away from them. Only he’d started the whole thing, too. And that was worse.

Hux was shaking when he reached for the towel that Ren brought from the fresher. Ren saw the shaking, probably also felt it, and stared at him. 

“I wanted to think that you’d come here for me,” Hux said, because he needed Ren to stay, at least for a few more minutes. He needed it enough to humiliate himself by speaking the truth that Ren knew anyway. 

Ren wiped his cock off with the same towel Hux had used. He threw it on the floor and stood in place, a few feet from the bed. He looked contemplative, sad. Hux had lost count of the scars on Ren’s shoulders, back, and chest, even on his legs. He’d stopped asking where they’d come from long ago. 

“Why do you still wear that necklace?” Ren asked. 

Hux reached for it instinctively; when he put his hand around the crystal he felt protective, as if Ren might try to take it from him. 

“It’s mine,” Hux said, matching Ren’s tone: flat, just verging on defensive. “Why shouldn’t I wear it?”

“Because I gave it to you, and you never stopped thinking of me as your enemy.” 

“That’s not true.” 

“Fuck you, I can read your thoughts.” 

“Well, I never gave you permission to do so! Maybe that’s why I lost whatever trust in you I tried to have. You’ve never considered that?”

“I’m not pinning you down and scraping my way into your mind,” Ren said. Hux hadn’t seen him cry in a long time; he didn’t want to now, but he liked that Ren was upset, that he seemed to actually care. “You _want_ me to know that you find me convenient at best.” 

“You’re a lousy mind-reader, Ren.” 

Hux was surprised by how uneven his voice suddenly sounded. He wasn’t crying, but the thing that had once felt too massive and powerful inside him, the thing he’d had to vent in pathetic sobs against Ren’s bare shoulder on Warl, now felt much too small, and he was in mourning for it as he rolled away from Ren, showing him his wrecked ass and his narrow shoulder blades. Ren had kissed them as if they were very delicate once, whispering that they looked like little wings. 

“Hux,” Ren said. His voice was uneven, too, though perhaps less so. He sat on the bed. Hux tried to shrug Ren off when he slid his hand onto Hux’s arm, but it wasn’t much of an effort. Ren leaned down and put his face against Hux’s throat, licked over his pulse point. 

“I gave up a lot for you, too,” Hux said when Ren licked him there again, and again. 

“Like what.” 

“My sanity, for one.” 

Ren stretched out behind him in the bed. Hux couldn’t remember the last time they’d stayed together like this, with Ren holding him from behind. Ren resumed the old position gingerly, as if he was afraid to scare Hux away. As if anything could have summoned Hux from the heat of Ren’s chest as he curved around Hux’s back. Ren tucked his arm around Hux and slid his hand up to cover the crystal on his necklace. 

“There’s something I never told you,” Ren said, his lips resting against Hux’s ear. 

“I’m sure there are lots of things you’ve never told me.” 

“Yes. This, though. I should have.” 

Hux was afraid to ask. He pressed back against Ren, savoring the feeling of his strength and his strange softness. He knew before Ren spoke that it was their last time. He’d felt it when Ren was inside him. 

“I was allowed to take a lover at twenty,” Ren said. “But I’m meant to give him up at thirty.” 

Hux said nothing for some long minutes. He’d feared the news would be worse. The sun had gone down outside; now the glow around the edges of the curtain was from the motel’s neon sign.

“Shall I give back the necklace, then?” Hux asked, when he trusted his voice to stay steady. 

“No,” Ren said. He swallowed, clung. “That was mine to give.”

“Unlike your body. Or your--” Hux stopped himself from saying anything so ludicrous as _your heart_ , because Ren would hear it anyway, without Hux having to suffer the humiliation of vocalizing it. 

“Yes,” Ren said. “I once thought-- Ten years sounded like such a long time. And. That night. I would have agreed to anything, to be allowed to go to you.” 

“Then you would have agreed to kill me when you were through me, that night?”

“No, no-- Hux, no.” Ren’s arms tightened around Hux as if that were still a possibility, and as if it scared him. Hux winced around a kind of whimper that he didn’t want to let loose, and relaxed his features when it had been successfully squashed. Ren’s thumb stroked over the piece of quintessence. “The world will soon change,” he said. “When you’ve fired your weapon. There will be no time or place for this, for us.” 

“There never was one, really,” Hux said, and he sat up, letting Ren’s arms fall away, telling himself it would be easier to be the one who broke free and left the bed first. He crossed the room and managed to light a cigarette with his shaking hands. Ren was sitting up in bed, watching him. “Are you reading my mind now?” Hux asked. 

Ren didn’t answer, which was as good as saying yes. So he knew Hux was crushed, that he felt betrayed but not surprised, that he would take the necklace off as soon as Ren left this room, and that he would never put it back on. 

After that last encounter, Ren was in Hux’s presence more often than ever, using Starkiller as a home base during the search for Skywalker. Hux alternated between restrained kindness and barely concealed hatred in their encounters, which remained entirely professional. Ren was cold to him without fail. The good apprentice, unwavering in his obedience to his master’s command. Hux dreamed of crushing the piece of quintessence under his boot, daring Ren to watch without reacting. In reality, he kept it in the back of his underwear drawer, rolled up into a handkerchief that had once belonged to his mother. The crystal was much too strong to be crushed by the likes of him, anyway. 

“Sir?” 

Hux wakes up to the voice of a ghost, and then to her face, which shows open concern before she straightens her posture. 

“Phas-- Phasma!” Hux stands as if to embrace her, which would be insane. He’s still half-asleep, so he reaches up and touches her shoulder as if she’s a real friend. She’s smiling, wearing medbay-issue sweats though she appears uninjured. Ren is still in the tank, still unconscious. “I fell asleep,” Hux says, looking back to Phasma after he’s checked on Ren. “What’s happened-- I was afraid-- Our initial assessment suggested you might have been left behind on Starkiller.” 

“I nearly was, sir. I had an encounter with FN-2187 and another Resistance fighter.” Her face falls, then resumes its usual stoicism. “I’ve given my report to Commander Ryti. She knows that the sabotage of Starkiller was my fault.” 

“I’m sure it’s not that simple.” Hux has already settled the blame on Ren, though he doesn’t know the full story there either. “Sit down, here, let’s find you a chair.”

By the time Phasma has given him her recounting of the incidents that led to Starkiller’s destruction, Hux isn’t sure that it wasn’t a flaw in his own design that led to the disaster. It seems impossible that FN-2187 could have been behind the whole thing, but also makes perfect sense. In a way, it was a design flaw in Brendol’s program that brought them here. Brendol did not account for a silently brilliant strategist ending up in his Institute, biding his time. 

“We should have promoted that traitor,” Hux says when Phasma is watching him, waiting for his assessment. “He should have been on the bridge, advising. Our mistake was asking him to fire a blaster like a common grunt. Of course he came to hate us, for underestimating him.” 

“I believe FN-2187 was fundamentally corrupt on an ideological level, sir. In ways that I personally failed to address in a timely fashion. So it is, again, really my fault.” 

“No, it’s mine. But I appreciate your willingness to take responsibility. Did I ever talk with you about my father?”

“The Commandant?” Phasma raises her eyebrows. “No, sir. I believe he died when you were quite young?” 

“He did. I didn’t feel young at the time, but I certainly was.” Hux thinks of that gazebo in the rain, sixteen-year-old Ren’s awkward sincerity when he plucked the necklace from his robes and held it out for Hux to take. “I suddenly find myself wondering what my life would have been like if my father had lived,” Hux says. “How things would have been-- So different.” 

“You were close to him?”

“Yes-- Eventually. We were very alike. I saw to that. I became like him, at his urging.” 

“Sir.” Phasma nods to the bacta tank when Hux looks over at her. Ren is waking, twitching and blinking, his heart rate increasing rapidly on the nearby monitors. 

Hux leaps out of his chair in what may be an incriminating fashion. Phasma stands, too, and goes to fetch the doctor. Hux walks to the tank and stands close enough for Ren’s groggy gaze to find his. Their eyes lock, and Hux can hear it, on the monitors, when Ren’s wild heartbeat begins to calm. 

“I’m here,” Hux says, under his breath. Ren won’t hear him, is probably too out of it to even use the Force to pick up on Hux’s words, but Hux needs to say it, for himself. “You’re all right, here I am. I’ve not left you, I won’t.” 

He makes himself stop babbling when the doctor hurries into the room. Witnessing the process of extracting Ren from the bacta makes Hux’s already tender stomach lurch, but he remains in place and watches everything. Ren is transferred to a bio bed with a covered top, at Hux’s request. For privacy reasons. Hux marches alongside it as droids convey it to Ren’s quarters. Hux will be back on shift in three hours, after only a few moments of uncomfortable sleep in that chair. He’s got no time left to waste on fooling himself: he intends to use those hours to lie in Ren’s arms one last time, if Ren will allow it. 

The droids leave supplies for Ren’s further care before Hux orders them away with the empty bio bed. Ren is on his back in his own bed. Hux has adjusted the room’s lights to twenty percent. For some time he stands over Ren’s bed, listening to Ren breathe and waiting for him to speak. Ren’s skin looks polished and smells medicated, even from where Hux stands. His hair is limp upon the pillow, damp from the hosing down he got in the tank, after the bacta was drained. 

“I’m so tired,” Hux admits. 

Ren turns his head on the pillow but doesn’t quite meet Hux’s eyes. Hux has yet to find a clean command cap or greatcoat, and his boots still have a bit of Ren’s blood on them. 

“Do you know what happened?” Ren asks. His voice is neither inviting nor cold. He sounds very tired himself. 

“Well, yes,” Hux says. “Starkiller blew up. The Resistance was behind the attack. Who cut your face?”

Ren turns to look at the ceiling again. “You wouldn’t understand,” he says.

“Ah. Of course. Listen, would you mind terribly if I rested here until my next shift? If I walk to my own room there will be ten people ready to accost me on the way there with some urgent--” 

“Hux.” It’s an admonishment, for hiding behind an excuse. “Yes. Come here.” 

Hux takes off his uniform shirt, then his boots, his pants. Along with his undershirt and shorts, he leaves his socks on, because he never did that when they were still fucking. Ren moves over, giving Hux only enough room to stretch out on his side, facing Ren. When Ren slides his arm out, offering his bicep as a pillow, Hux accepts without meeting his gaze, settling there and staring down at the freshly healed wound on Ren’s side, raw pink scar tissue forming a kind of starburst. 

“That will need ointment in an hour,” Hux says. His voice is soft; maybe he sounds embarrassed, or overly hopeful. He touches the edges of the new scar very lightly, and hears Ren’s breath stutter. 

“He’ll be angry,” Ren says, and Hux looks up to glare at him, angry himself for the mention of Snoke. Ren could have waited a few minutes, at least. “You didn’t deliver me to him as requested.” 

“I will, for fuck’s sake, and he must know why I delayed. You would have died if I’d taken you to that shithole hideout of his directly.” 

“No. I would have been in pain, but not dead.” 

“Well, I didn’t know that. I’m not a fucking soothsayer. Snoke is well aware of that. He also knows that I care about you. He saw to that, according to plan. So he can fuck right off if he’s got a problem with my feelings for you continuing past your thirtieth birthday. He controls what you feel, maybe, apparently, but not me.”

Hux’s face is very hot. He doesn’t appreciate the pity in Ren’s eyes, though maybe it’s actually something else. He wants Ren to kiss him, almost badly enough to beg for it. 

“At the Institute that day,” Ren says, “When we first met, do you remember that I told you I was jealous, because I’d sensed how much your father loved you, and that he believed you would do great things?”

“Oh-- Fuck, Ren, please-- Don’t tell me that was a lie, I couldn’t bear that right now, please--”

“Hux, no-- It wasn’t a lie.” Ren puts his forehead against Hux’s, strokes his cheek. Hux keeps his eyes pinched shut tight, trembling all over with the effort of holding on to the belief that what Ren told him about Brendol was true, that Ren didn’t only say that to flatter him or trick him or-- “Of course it was true,” Ren says, his lips moving on Hux’s cheek, fingers sliding into his hair. “Why wouldn’t he be proud of you? You were everything he’d wanted in a son.”

“Past tense, yes. Now I’m a massive failure. Fuck, why are you telling me this, why are we talking at all? I just want to sleep.” 

“I know what you want. I’m trying to give it to you. Please, listen.” 

Hux opens his eyes. He’s cautious, afraid to hope he'll hear anything but more bad news. He looks up at Ren and takes a deep breath, pressing into Ren’s touch when he runs his thumb over Hux’s ear. 

“That day,” Ren says. “Snoke made no mention of a boy my age being there. I hadn’t been around anyone but Snoke since I’d left my family. I was excited to even see stormtroopers and some stuffy Commandant who oversaw them. And then there you were, without warning. First it was your hair. Your eyes, maybe, too. I just wanted to look at you. It was such a relief. It made me annoyed with you, because I wasn’t supposed to want relief from what I’d chosen. Then I sensed how desperately you wanted to please your father. That was something I’d never felt. It was strange, sort of extraordinary. Foreign. When we walked above the mess hall, you wanted to stop and look at the stormtroopers’ faces. When your father talked of the children taken from Outer Rim worlds, you wondered if I’d been a slave. You felt something-- The beginning of something. Sympathy, curiosity, as if I was a person who need saving. I wanted to throw it off like a blanket someone had tried to put around my shoulders. That was my instinct with everyone who tried to help me, always. But then you looked so startled when I glared at you for it, and I thought-- I don’t want to frighten him. That was when it really began, for me. It’s true that Snoke used the Force to trip you on the stairs. He meant for me to catch you. But I’d already-- It was me, Hux. He felt me wanting to reach out to this other person. To you. I wanted you already. It was small, just the start of something, but it was always mine.” 

Hux has closed his eyes again. He wants to speak, to ask Ren why he’s saying all this now. He wants to try to not believe it, but he can’t. It feels as if a knife that’s been lodged in his chest for ten years has just been removed. Now he’s bleeding everywhere, doomed, but the relief of no longer breathing against a blade is so pure, so good. He puts his arms around Ren and holds on, buries his face against Ren’s neck. Ren takes a deep breath and exhales slowly. He pushes his hand up under the back of Hux’s tank and strokes soft fingertips along his spine until he shivers. 

“They incinerated my clothes in medbay,” Ren says when Hux just goes on clinging to him, not trusting himself to form words. “Too much blood and too many rips-- They weren’t salvageable, according to the droids, so they’re gone. The belt, too, though that could have been saved. And you dropped your tracking remote in the snow when you found me. So all our tokens are gone.”

“Tokens?” Hux says, his face still hidden against Ren’s skin. 

“Your tracker on my belt, my necklace under your shirt. It was the same, wasn’t it? I was so happy when you devised that tracker, when you put it there knowing I would sense it, hoping I would let you have that connection to me. I thought, finally. You had my necklace. It was only fair that I should have something of yours. You invented it for me, even.” 

“I didn’t-- It was an existing technology.” 

“Yes, but the particular device you inserted into the belt. You made that, like I made the necklace.” 

Hux sniffs, almost laughing. He pushes his leg up between Ren’s powerful thighs, wanting them to crush around him until his own thigh goes numb. He wants to be closer, closer. Ren is so warm, and with his nose pressed to Ren’s skin Hux can smell the real scent of him, buried under the lingering aroma of bacta. It’s something that belongs only to Hux: this human scent that hides on Ren’s body, only detectable by someone who is glued to him like this.

“Is there really a rule about-- Ten years?” Hux asks. “Or did you just make that up to get rid of me?”

“I did make it up. But not to get rid of you.” 

“Why, then?”

 _Because you broke my heart, asshole_.

“When?” Hux asks, pulling back to look up into Ren’s face. “How?”

“Incrementally. You began to hate me for letting him keep me away. I hated you back for not trusting me, not ever.” 

“The morning after that night on Warl, you were gone and Snoke was there, he said--”

“I know. He kept that from me for a long time. But I know now. Something happened on Starkiller, when I dropped my helmet. All has become clear to me. You can sleep now. I’ll wake you when you need to return to duty.” 

“Ren.” Hux groans and sits up, rubs at his eyes. “You can’t just say, ‘all has become clear’ and then tell me to sleep. What’s become clear?”

“I can’t speak of it. Hux, please. Trust me. Even just for now. Trust that I can’t explain but that I won’t hurt you.” 

“You confounding bastard,” Hux says, but he settles into Ren’s arms again, flexing gladly against the solid heat of his body, too tired to fight away the comfort it brings to have him so close, if never close enough. 

And hasn’t that always been the way of it. 

 

**

 

Even when things were much less complicated, it was rare for them to wake up together. Hux can’t remember the last time they did, and can barely force himself to remember where he is and all that’s happened when he wakes to Ren’s whispers in his ear, Ren’s hand on his face and his tented erection hot and heavy on Hux’s thigh. 

“Your shift starts in twenty minutes,” Ren says when Hux blinks at him. 

Hux kisses him. Ren opens for it, sighs into Hux’s mouth, sucks at the tip of his tongue. At the edges of Hux’s consciousness, all the horrors that are waiting for him outside of this bed prod and poke, and he clings to Ren to keep them away for a little longer. He rolls onto his back, pulls Ren on top of him, and arches up against the feeling of his perfect weight, kisses him so hard. 

“Inside me,” Hux says when Ren grinds down against him. “Please,” he says when Ren leans back to look at him. Hux touches the scar on Ren’s face, envying the person who put it there. Whoever they are, they’re likely to see more of Ren than Hux ever will again, once this half-awake moment ends. 

It’s been almost seven months since that shore leave on Yinnix and what Hux thought would be their last time together. He tells himself that, if he’d felt certain about it then, and now-- Maybe this isn’t really the last time either.

But this feels different. Different from the first time, too. Ren is quiet, careful but sure. He knows Hux’s body well now, and he strokes an orgasm out of him with two fingers, curling just right inside him, pressing just so. Hux tries to stay quiet, too, but he’s moaning Ren’s name for the first thick push of his cock, the feeling of having Ren back where he belongs tearing apart all the old seams Hux never bothered to try to mend anyway. He clings with both arms wrapped around Ren’s neck, holds on so tight that Ren can only thrust shallowly, or maybe he’s just trying to make this last. 

“I won’t believe you didn’t know,” Hux says when Ren stops kissing him long enough to allow for some breathless words that Hux will probably regret. Ren’s eyes are bright, interested; the scar makes him look younger, somehow. “How I felt,” Hux says when Ren seems reluctant to just read his meaning from his thoughts. “You knew.” Hux squeezes around him like he’s chastising him for this. Ren’s eyes fall shut, but only for a moment. “I was the one who never knew anything,” Hux says. 

“I’m going to fix it,” Ren says. He sounds like a boy again, too, like he’s shucked all the wasted years off. “I promise.” 

“Come in me,” Hux says, wanting to leave enough time for a few minutes to lie together afterward, at least until their sweat has cooled. “Please-- Ren, just fuck me, do it, fix me like you always do.” 

He didn’t mean to say that-- he must have meant to say _fuck_ me, not _fix_ me --but it sets off something in Ren that Hux will never forget. Ren’s eyes go almost entirely black, pupils fattening to devour the iris, and he sits back, drawing worshipful fingertips from Hux’s nipples down to his hips. 

_Fix me like you always do_. That’s Ren’s voice in Hux’s head, maybe unintentionally, because it seems like Ren is just repeating that phrase to himself over and over again as he pumps his cock into Hux, reveling in that misspoken request. This repetition only ceases when Ren comes, pressing impossibly deeper and holding Hux open that much wider while he pulses into him, gasping and falling forward to brace his hands around Hux’s head on the pillow. Hux pulls him down and laps at his panting mouth, feels Ren’s heartbeat beginning to calm against his chest as they sink into each other one more time, clutching at this last scrap of bitter shelter as if it’s a tattered old blanket against a snowstorm, holding on until a strong enough wind rips it away at last. Hux needs to dress, to go. He has a ship to run. Ren has to start down whatever path he’s found in his new clarity. 

“I was going to take you to him myself,” Hux says when he understands that he won’t. Ren shakes his head. 

“Too dangerous,” he says. 

“You’re going to--” 

“Shhh.” Ren leans down and kisses him, says _Yes_ and _Goodbye_ without speaking. 

Ten minutes later, Hux is on the bridge. He watches Ren’s shuttle leave the _Finalizer_ , but only from a monitor. It’s just a little red blip moving through the surrounding dark. Hux thinks of that piece of crystallized quintessence, destroyed along with the weapon it inspired. Only, no: the leather banding Ren made for it will have melted in Starkiller’s death throes, but the crystal itself is made of stronger stuff than that. It’s still floating through space, set free but intact. Hux feels sure of it, suddenly. 

The next time he hears from Ren is by pre-recorded holo, weeks later. Snoke is dead, Ren won’t be returning to the Order, Hux won’t be hearing from him again through this channel or any others. 

“I’ll come for you when it’s safe,” Ren says. He doesn’t even sound like he believes it; his eyes are full of apologies. “That may be many years from now.” 

Many years from now: Hux will have filled in the missing pieces, the bit about Ren being ordered to kill his father and how the hollow sense of weakness that followed broke Snoke’s hold over him at last. Hux never assigns himself a role in this epiphany. He was never enough of an incentive to tear Ren away from Snoke before, and Ren has not come back to him in Snoke’s absence. Ren has instead gone back to what’s left of his family, according to their intelligence reports. 

Ren, who accused Hux of breaking his heart for imagining they would always be enemies. 

_I’ll come for you when it’s safe_. What Ren really meant was _when you’re defeated_ , when the Resistance has made the galaxy safe for the side Ren ultimately chose. Hux will fight like hell to keep Ren from fulfilling that prophecy, though it was probably more of a shallow kiss-off. 

Hux now doesn’t have time to drink in the wardroom with Phasma or anyone else, but he thinks of it often, fantasizing about having someone to confide in. He imagines what he might say to Phasma, after a few drinks, with a fake smile and a shrug of one shoulder. 

“To traitors,” maybe, and they would toast, both pretending not to be gutted by the sound of that word. “And to the ignorant bliss we lived in when we trusted them with our lives.” 

Because that was the punchline, arriving like a pre-recorded holo on delayed delivery: Hux didn’t realize, until Ren threw it in his face, that he _had_ actually always trusted Ren in some fundamental way that went beyond the orders they shared and the motives Ren concealed. That was why Ren couldn’t use his powers to sense Hux’s secret loyalty, his slavish longing, or the desperate amount of trust he placed in Ren again and again, against his better instincts. Hux hadn’t even recognized these things in himself until it was too late. Not until Ren was gone for good did he feel the solid, hopelessly immense weight of what he’d somehow been counting on all along, and it’s always with him now, his new token of Ren’s love. 

He fully intends to repay Ren with one of his own someday, just as before.

 

 

**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (This story will have a sequel. Stay tuned, and thanks so much for reading!)


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